Pokemon World: The Appearance of Mew
by ImJessieTR
Summary: The world will end just as it begins, unless Mew, Celebii, and Team Rocket stops it. Revised, please review! 1st of a trilogy
1. Desperation

**I would like to thank Nintendo for Pokemon, characters, and regions. I would like to thank the Serebii, Team Rocket's Rockin', Pokeschool, and Tvtome websites for plot reminders and theories. Jennifer, Jacob, and Janice are my characters as well as specific interpretations of the origin of the legendaries.**

Pokemon World: The Appearance of Mew (edited to create better readability)

Chapter One: Desperation

Peru, ca. 2010

GASP!

A young woman instinctively drew the first breath she had had in hours. Her head swam in a numbed pain, her muscles audibly ripping with every slight movement, her blood dripping down the rocky outcropping where she found herself lying. Time had been a dark, lonely eternity as her mind floated in nothingness. She tried to open her eyes, but they had long ago been swollen shut from her injuries.

How?

How did she get there?

The young woman tried to remember, but clear memories were growing rarer. All she remembered was that there had been a blast - a tremendous force of power that had flung her off a cliff toward the valley below, hidden in a deep mist.

"Uuunnnnhhhh," she groaned as she tried to pull herself up. It was no good - she was fighting the inertia of being comatose for weeks. Her muscles had atrophied, her organs screaming for water and nutrients, her brain throbbing from immense swelling.

She screamed suddenly, jerking up with an impossibly strong reserve of power. Her cat! She had to save her cat!

The thought of her white, fluffy kitten brought back a stream of memories...

_The last ten acres of rain forest in Peru were about to be logged. Workers had run up against environmental fanatics, plagues of microbial diseases, and tribal guerilla warfare. Still, the bulldozers came. Soon there were only a few trees left standing..._

_Jennifer stared at the map of Peru while her kitten, Jewel, purred happily among her catnip toys. She banged her fist against the table, ripping the map accidentally. She couldn't get the injunction in time, she grumbled to herself, and now her years of hard work were meaningless. If only the international community could prioritize! She couldn't bring herself to admit the fight was over, a fight over the last vestiges of natural beauty. Already the news channels showed hordes of apocalyptic dancers in the streets of just about every country - shouting out, singing almost, about the Coming, the coming of the End. She just couldn't let that happen. Jennifer bit her lip, thinking that apathy and laziness was finally catching up to everyone._

_Shouting interrupted her self-inflicted pity session. Jennifer rushed out of her tattered trailer, followed by Jewel, and ran toward a group of loggers, trapped in a fight with tribal locals. Guns, rocks, firecrackers, gas, poison darts - anything that was handy became fair game. The loggers' bulldozers had hit some ruins, causing the battle with the locals. A stone temple, bricks crumbling underneath the heavy machinery, broke from the dark, rich earth. Jennifer and a few other coworkers, the ones not currently involved with heated arguments and rioting, stared awestruck at such an amazing find. Surely, the logging would have to stop - after all, now the site could be considered a historically-endangered site and receive legal protections it didn't have as just a fading resource for wood. The skies darkened above the fray as casualties mounted. Jewel, usually very aloof and contented, growled and ran back toward the trailer. Strange, thought Jennifer, Jewel never got angry about anything. She saw a tenth person go down, and noticed a strange sound in the air, almost like some sort of chime. She thought she could also hear choppers in the distance, but it was hard to hear through the shouting and gunfire. Her blood ran cold - something wasn't right. The winds picked up and dust devils swirled around the combatants, while the rocks and bricks beneath them shimmered eerily. A small white orb, possibly ball lightning she supposed, appeared in the midst of the mob. As Jennifer absorbed the situation, she could smell rank gunpowder. A bomb..._

_BBBBOOOOOOOMMMMMM!_

_Just as the orb exploded, so did the bomb the loggers had set to break up the rioting. People were flung in all directions, the smell of blood and burnt flesh mingling with gunpowder and a strange, grass-like scent like a fresh-cut lawn. As Jennifer felt herself soar through the air, she looked in the direction of her trailer, watching in horror as Jewel ran inside just as the blast collapsed her temporary home._

Jennifer slumped backwards, her exhaustion defeating her sudden surge of strength. As soon as she could get up, she'd look around for Jewel. Hopefully, she was still alive. After all, Jennifer had been closer to the blast and SHE was still breathing.

She lay back on the hard rock, barely able to see the bright blue sky above her through swollen eyes. Just as she was beginning to lose conciousness again, she thought she saw a faint pink orb floating high above her...


	2. A Beginning

Chapter Two: A Beginning

Peru, ca. 2010

The tiny feline opened her eyes, straining to see through the dark clouds of dust hanging in the air. She could feel the weight of a wall on top of her and her paws throbbed. Jewel tried to look around, tried to see if she had been injured severely, tried to locate her owner, but all she could see was metal, plastic, and dust. Jewel tried to get up, but her head felt twice as big as normal and her neck wasn't strong enough yet to lift such weight. Jewel sighed. She wondered if she were going to die. _That's just my luck_, she thought - _to get dragged into a bug-infested, violence-torn, hot, steamy waste of land - and now it's all over_.

As she closed her eyes, Jewel could hear her owner whimpering. Strangely, she couldn't tell where the voice was coming from. It seemed to be coming from inside her head. Jennifer, her owner, was hurt - dying, maybe. If only she could get up, maybe she could help. She strained and pulled and pushed, but the wall on top of her wouldn't give an inch. She let out a scream of frustration. Darn it! (or something similar) I've got to get up!

Her eyes opened, but all she could see was a pink glow. Jewel vented her frustration on the wall, cursing it for everything it was worth, letting out a torrent of anger...

The walls around her leapt up from the ground and flew off in every direction. Air rushed in to fill the space, and Jewel, strengthened by her newfound energy, ripped into the surrounding area, tearing through trees, burying the slain people in piles of dirt and rocks, sending leaves hurtling through the air with such speed that they chopped chunks out of the loggers' heavy machinery.

Having laid waste to a good portion of the loggers' work area, Jewel let out a sigh of relief. It was important to let out one's feelings every now and again, and she DID feel better now. Jewel looked around her, below her - and she gasped. She was in the AIR! She twirled around in all directions, trying to see what held her up, but realizing that, in fact, she was FLYING. She smiled to herself.

AWESOME!

This was definitely more like it!

Jewel zigzagged through the remaining trees, flew loop-de-loops in the air, and summoned large twisters that scoured the land.

Still, she felt a tinge of trepidation, a nagging thought that wouldn't leave her. She had heard some sort of sound before the blast, a sound she couldn't quite compare to anything she ever heard, but it did kind of sound like some musical note that Jennifer meditated by. She knew that that sound was a warning, a warning that this wouldn't be the only change around - no, it was a warning that Earth itself was evolving a new strategy to protect itself. She decided the responsible thing to do was to leave (after finding Jennifer and making sure she was all right, of course), leave for parts unknown.

Jewel mewed cheerfully, despite her worries about that sound, and flew high into the air. As she looked around from her new vantage point, she saw her owner, her long red hair flowing seamlessly into a puddle of blood, lying motionless on an outcropping just past a cliff. Jewel descended slightly, and felt Jennifer's life force hanging on despite severe pain.

Jewel stared at her owner for a few minutes. Jennifer's eyes began to flutter, and Jewel paused, trying to come up with some sort of feeling. Her owner was alive, and Jewel couldn't be a pet anymore - not with her newfound purpose. She hadn't felt anything, originally, but it seemed as if the planet itself was whispering to her, informing her of an important mission that would change history forever. Earth had had Legendaries before, long before humans walked the land, and now there were none. Jewel saw her former owner's eyes open as she floated in the sky. They had to come back. They could set things right. People would have no choice but to change or face their wrath. Jewel mewed as loudly as she could as she flew off, away from her past life as a mere companion for humans. Mew would re-awaken the Titans from their long vacation, beginning with the Ancients - the predecessors of the modern age. Mew felt the Earth instructing her, showing her in her heart how to put them back on the map. There'd have to be a little tweaking, to put them in direct confrontation with human beings. Mew didn't want to hurt Jennifer, but the planet was in its death-throes, and the Legendaries had to come back to set things right.

Peru, ca. 2010

Meanwhile, some tiles on the broken bricks of the ancient temple shattered as an energy wave swirled up from the lost civilization, reconfiguring the work area, absorbing all the strewn documents and mystical symbols lying all over the ground. The writings jumped off pages and tiles - dancing, swirling, spinning in the air before being sucked into a vortex of pink-purple clouds, disappearing as quickly as they had been born, to be unknown until the rebirth of Earth's legends.


	3. The Realization

Chapter Three: The Realization

Peru, ca. 2010

BAM!

Jennifer, her long red hair tied loosely in a large bun behind her, banged her fist against the small wooden table. It had taken her a week to walk to the nearest town, a town with less than a hundred people - angry people who distrusted and hated Americans for profiting off their land as if it belonged to them. Here she was, broken and unarmed, facing an officer of the Peruvian military police and a group of testy locals who had heard of the tragic explosion that cost about thirty lives, lives the small town couldn't easily replace. Jennifer gritted her teeth and wiped the sweat off of her face. She still felt a little woozy after the blast, and she still hadn't found her cat Jewel, either. She had searched for two days, but there was no sign of her. She tried to shake her frustration out of her mind. She glared at the officer.

"I'm not leaving until I have some sort of explanation," Jennifer demanded.

Nonplussed, the officer crossed his arms and inhaled briefly, his frown unchanging. "No, Señora," the officer repeated rather gruffly, "Returning to Los Estados Unidos is the only way to ensure your safety. Our people here, they ... dislike you, Señora."

The small crowd outside the hut stared as the American woman was escorted out of town, her face betraying the pain of being thrown nearly to her death. Some hoped she'd die before she reached the airport.

The rickety white two-seater airplane did not fill her with enthusiasm. Jennifer tried not to stare out the small thick window, but she found the land and ocean calming.

All Jennifer could think about was the lack of papers, photos, anything she could have brought back with her - if Peru would have let her. Something had gone dreadfully wrong, something bigger than a failed logging expedition. She had been sent there by Greenpeace to stop them, but the explosion solved everyone's problems - if you considered an untimely death a solution.

Lavaridge, ca. 2509

_"See? That's why I don't let you tell the stories," Molly griped, yanking the paper away from Max's hands. The girl from Greenfield in Johto met Max when her father took a trip to Rustboro in Hoenn. They discovered they liked the same things and had become fast friends, even if they did argue a lot. _

Max re-adjusted his glasses and snorted. "Give that back! You were just going to tell some sissy girlie story anyway."

Molly clutched the paper tightly and half-angrily pushed Max out of his seat as they sat on the steps in front of a Pokemon Center. "At least MY story wasn't going to be filled with death and explosions and blood - you're such a ... such a ... GUY"

Max stood up and grunted his disapproval. He hated being interrupted in a story. Ash and company had been investigating the mystery of some ruins containing strange languages written in raised bubbles. They had been helping the researchers in town read countless stories about ancient pokemon and Max thought they were too boring. He and Molly figured they could write a better one, which they had plenty of time to do as no one was paying them much attention anyway. Maybe, Max and Molly had thought to themselves, they could get their story published on the internet and become famous. "Look" Max muttered indignantly"you can tell your part of the story when it's your turn. Until then, if I'm forced to write about a girl, then it's going to happen MY way, got it?"

Molly frowned, shoving the papers back at Max. "Okay," she said, defeated, "but you're making up the names of places. Try to keep the real regions in your story."

Max smiled in victory. "It's my story and I'm going to tell it like I want."

The United States, ca. 2010

Jennifer had to sit for hours at customs. The American agents had little use for eco-troublemakers at such a high stakes time in their history. If they had their way, no one would travel – it just created more red-tape headaches for them. Jennifer could sense something was wrong. The agents and guards were more nervous and paranoid than usual.

DING!

Jennifer waited for the announcement on the PA system, but there wasn't one. She couldn't understand. Suddenly, the entire airport went into a panic. Visitors either ran or stood, stunned. Security teams dashed back and forth, cradling their walkie-talkies next to their ears. The walls and floors shimmered into an eerie light, and Jennifer realized in horror that it was the same sound she had heard in Peru. The walls instantly mildewed as brown leaves came flying in through the windows. Jennifer watched as everyone around her vanished in a bright white light. Air swirled around her, vines creeping up her chair. She yelped as the light took her, too.


	4. Awakening

Chapter Four: Awakening

Pacific Ocean, ca. 2010

Mew panted as she sat on a boulder atop a mountain, the cold and cloudy air numbing the wounds on her legs and tail.

A few hours earlier, Mew had found herself in a large, cramped city bustling with loud vehicles and even louder people. The grey-black smog hid the details of the various signs on the buildings on this particular day. Mew was trying to understand her purpose, a purpose given to her by Earth itself as it suffered under the reign of human apathy. She knew she had to awaken the Titans, who had guarded the Earth when people were still throwing sticks at mammoths, but she didn't know where to look.

As she teleported to various city hotspots, she wondered if she could find Earth's legendaries in time. Mew dropped to an alley, smelling rotting food from a nearby restaurant, her stomach growling, not having eaten since she left her owner. Mew found plenty of half-eaten fish, hamburgers, and chicken wings to devour, her stomach growling with impatience.

Only it wasn't HER stomach that was growling anymore...

Mew turned around to find the forms of dogs, black with touches of brown on their undersides, a Doberman, its pointy head lowered menacingly, and a Rottweiler, its broad face grimacing with hatred, staring her down, their teeth bared. Mew noted with horror that there seemed to be strands of fur in their yellow teeth. The two dogs took up most of the width of the small alley, blocking the escape of this pitiful cat.

They lunged...

Mew shot up into the air, swirling dust and meaty tidbits up into the air, the dogs yelping as they smacked the brick wall of one of the grimy, soot-covered buildings. Mew prepared to teleport when she felt a sharp pain in her tail. The Doberman had leapt up, using the brick wall for a boost, and grabbed Mew's tail with its jaws. Mew was thrust down into the concrete, her eyes sensing a wash of black spots swirling around her from the popped blood vessels. Mew turned to look at her attacker, but the predator bit down even harder and began to shake its prey violently.

"MMMEEEEWWWWW" she screamed, a violent pink blast of light hurling the dogs toward the far end of the alley. Mew quickly closed her eyes and felt her strength return slowly, not all of it, but enough to get her out of this situation. Mew reared her front legs back, summoning a large black-purplish ball which she threw at her enemies. The dogs dodged, despite being stunned at the strange behavior of their prey. They were used tothis deadly game – one where the losers lost their lives as punishment, much to their glee and satisfaction. They realized that this wasn't going to be a game anymore - something was profoundly different about their latest plaything.

The Rottweiler howled in pain as bony structures grew above its eyes, stretching back toward the ears. Growths of bone also surrounded its wrists and across its back. Mew floated in front of them, tilting her head toward her shoulder in confusion. Suddenly, the newly-emerged Houndour locked its hate-filled eyes on the cause of all its pain. Mew saw the new creature twitch. All of a sudden it was just a blur, moving too fast for Mew to see. Just as she prepared to block her right side with a psychic blast, the Houndour crunched its jaws around the left side of her abdomen.

_Well_, Mew thought angrily to herself, _this didn't go according to plan_.

She let loose a gigantic beam of prism-colored light at the pokemon, but the Houndour shrugged it off just as its partner, large curved horns emerging from its head, countered with an explosive burst of flame.

The two dark-elemental pokemon looked at each other, having seen the tremendous pain in their opponent's eyes, realizing that now they were causing more damage than they were before. This was more like it, they thought to themselves. Both canine pokemon reared their heads back to engulf Mew in a gigantic blaze. Mew heard the voices of humans approaching behind her. She had a sudden conflict of emotions. She was destined to bring about their destruction, but not like this. These new creatures she had awakened were not fighting for survival but for sport. They had taken to their owners' hobbies all too well. Mew couldn't let this go on. The pink glow surrounding her brightened, and she felt the air itself rip away from them as they teleported to a more open area.

Mew left the two pokemon to fend for themselves on an island volcano that had long been dormant. Mew kept far above them, avoiding their new powers, aware that they somehow were unaffected by her psychic attacks but could seriously threaten her.

Lavaridge, ca. 2509

_"See?" Molly yelled, outraged at the latest post. She had been reviewing Max's part of the story, noting with disgust that this ... (ugh) boy had once again relied on bloodthirsty storytelling. Max sat back in the chair, his feet propped up on the computer desk in the lobby of the Pokemon Center. They had decided hours ago that typing was far superior to writing on paper. Molly teased Max about his sloppy handwriting, while Max countered that hers was too frilly._

_Max crossed his arms, indignant. "People like pokemon battles, Molly. They don't like flowers and icky romances and perfume and stuff."_

_"GET THOSE FEET OFF THAT DESK!" Nurse Joy yelled from behind her desk, her pink loopy hair ruffled and her normally smiling face frowning from dealing with a long line of whiny trainers. A contest was coming up, and they would ignore the six-foot-tall sign and ask her over and over again about the date – even though it was written in large block font._

_Molly shoved Max's feet out of the way. She tossed the boy out of the chair, listening with pride as Max yelped as he landed with a huge THUMP on the floor._

_"Let's fix this story," she muttered to herself gleefully._

Pacific Ocean, ca. 2010

Mew sat on the boulder, licking the bruise on her tail. She decided to take a dip in the ocean nearby. Surely its cold, crisp water would soothe the aches from her battle. Mew floated slowly toward the coast, careful to avoid the confused stares of human beings. She landed on a small grassy plot of sand near the breaking waves, the salt clearing up her sinuses. In the distance, Mew saw a pod of dolphins and whales swimming north, illuminated by the warm orange glow of the sun as it shone behind Mew. Mew wanted to see these strange water creatures, so she surrounded herself with a pink bubble, expanding it to allow for a large amount of air. She dove into the surf, staring with awe at the multi-colored creatures that swam around her with equal curiosity. There were animals and plants of every size, shape, color, and behavior. Surely, if Mew was to find a legendary creature, it would be in this fascinating world. A large brown fish swam past her, the ugliness of it astounding the feline pokemon. It seemed like it was made of peeling, flaking rocky skin. Mew could sense an ancientness about it, that it had survived several geological extinctions. As Mew passed by, the fish quickly went belly up, only to snap out of its trance a Relicanth. The new creature, not having increased any beauty scores, closed the distance between itself and Mew, stopping the feline pokemon. Mew, sensing its thoughts with her psychic powers, agreed to follow the new pokemon to the depths of the ocean. As they descended ever deeper, a reverberating sound nearly deafened Mew. A humongous dark figure appeared below them, a blue whale coming back from a long dive to the trenches below. As the Relicanth explained to Mew, this was also a very special creature, one that would help Mew unlock some of the Beings she sought. Mew closed her eyes and concentrated, feeling her power shape the whale into a more powerful form.

The Wailord bellowed loudly, shoving the two pokemon out of the way. Mew and the Relicanth surfaced after a long journey upwards. Mew gasped as the bubble collapsed, breathing in welcome fresh air. Relicanth, swimming just under the surface, warned Mew not to awaken the Titans they were guarding just yet. Before its species' relatives died out, Relicanth explained, there were gigantic flying creatures that came with the storms that terrorized the oceans. One in particular traveled across the Pacific Ocean, stopping occasionally on various islands before nesting in North America. It brought lightning and thunder, supposedly stealing human children for the babies' consumption even as recently as a hundred years ago. Relicanth didn't believe it existed anymore, but it thought that Mew might have the best luck trying to re-awaken Earth's legendary birds.

Various locations, ca. 2010

Meanwhile, inside the depths of pyramids across the planet, engravings of people and animal-inspired deities shimmered. In the entrance of every pyramid, a small purplish-black vortex formed, swirling with chaotic psychic energy. Small black and white creatures flew out of the vortex, changing sun, storm, and water-gods into the forms of the three elemental beasts that would storm the countryside in the near future - but only after the Origin, the Voice, and the Sacred Fire came together to awaken them. As soon as they finished defacing historical engravings with the faces of the legendary canines, the creatures returned to their home in a parallel dimension.


	5. Arrival

Chapter Five: Arrival

Lavaridge, ca. 2509

_Max sat on the floor beside Molly as she typed slowly on the Pokemon Center's computer. Max watched in irritation as his companion hunted and pecked her way across the keyboard. Finally, Molly sighed with relief as she finished her part of the chapter._

_Max yawned loudly, sticking his nose up into the air. "Finally! Nothing happened! Mew created a Relicanth and a Wailord! Wow," he sneered sarcastically, "I bet people wet themselves with excitement."_

_Molly turned toward Max. "Pffbt," she replied, sticking out her tongue, "you're just mad because no one died. Besides, one of those books Professor Birch was reading said those two pokemon were very important in those ruins and I thought it'd be neat if we included them in our story."_

_"Who are we going to wake up next?" Max asked, trying hard to ignore this confounding little girl. How could May believe that they liked each other? Eww..._

_Molly turned back toward the computer. "I think I'll continue about the Legendary Birds. They're very pretty and very strong, too."_

_Max wiped his nose with his hand. He looked around to make sure Ash, May, and Brock weren't in the lobby where they could hear him. "So, did you see that trailer for the disaster movie? Are you going to go see it? You know, the one where the ocean currents change and everything on Earth goes haywire?"_

_Molly raised her hand in a "talk to the hand" position, then resumed typing. "Of course not, moron. I already saw one like that, and it had pokemon in it - it was much better. I liked the song they played that fixed the weather. It sounded nice."_

_Behind the two pre-teens were Officer Jenny and Nurse Joy, sharing a much-deserved break during a lunch hour that should have come two hours earlier had not several emergencies demanded their attention. Jenny liked to come to the Pokemon Center during her breaks. Nurse Joy was so sweet and compassionate, a real empathetic woman who always seemed to say the right things to make you feel better. There had been so much crime lately that Jenny, brushing her long blue hair away from her lavender tea, found herself depending on Joy's good nature more and more often._

_Jenny sighed. "It's been bad enough that I've got Magma and Aqua executives running around town, but to have these idiotic Team Rocket members showing up, too- I just don't think the police can handle three crime bosses at one time."_

_Joy handed Jenny the pitcher of tea. She preferred coffee most of the time, since she had to work double shifts just about every day, but she knew Jenny's work made her stressed out. Caffeine was the last thingJenny needed after a day dealing with organized crime on a small budget. "Still, you should be happy that Team Rocket doesn't have a real base here in Hoenn. They can't seem to operate on the same level as our locals." She paused as Jenny sighed heavily, nearly dropping her teacup from exhaustion. "Besides, you did catch one of them, right?"_

_Jenny nodded slightly. "We caught the woman at two o'clock this morning. I believe the reports identify her as Jesse, a grunt from Team Rocket, Kanto division."_

_"You're not sure?" Joy asked. "Aren't they always advertising themselves?"_

_"That's just it - she has no identification. All three teams have identification, logos on their uniforms, that sort of thing. Even when they go in disguise, they're generally wearing their uniforms underneath. She put up quite a fight, and says she knows nothing about Team Rocket. I'm having a doctor check her, just in case she was involved in some psychic attack that wiped her memories. She looks like the woman in the report - skinny yet athletic, long red hair, an amazing temper - it has to be her."_

Pacific Ocean, ca. 2010

Mew surfaced to get some air, having said good-bye to the Relicanth she had created. Mew was learning that her very presence was altering the DNA of any living creature that came into contact with her, and she thought it'd be neat if it weren't so disconcerting. She couldn't yet describe the emotion she felt - it wasn't fear, dread, happiness, justification - she had tried to label her feelings, but the correct identification was just out of reach.

Mew saw a long, heavily-armed ship coming straight for her. Suddenly, a puff of smoke and a flash of light emanated from one of the cannons aboard the aircraft carrier. A thin grey-white missile rushed toward her. Mew threw up a giant pink barrier, then had second thoughts and dove down quickly into the water. The barrier she had erected for protection also carried a comfortable amount of air that would allow her to stay submerged for an hour or two. Then, she heard a large splash...

She looked up and found the missile coming for her through the water, and as she began to swim away she noticed two torpedoes coming for her as well, painted with dark glaring eyes and a red toothy grin. Mew flew through the dark blue water, trying to think of something. She flew past the torpedo on her left, narrowly missing the right incoming weapon. A large explosion burst the barrier and sent Mew sinking rapidly toward the ocean floor. The missile and one of the torpedoes has collided, knocking back the other torpedo. Mew had had the wind knocked out of her, and the worst part was that now she was out of air, too. The momentum of the explosion kept her heading downwards and Mew became terrified that she was going to drown. She didn't have enough time left to resurface and she was too stunned to teleport.

A large current caught Mew and shoved her into a more horizontal trajectory. She could feel darkness coming for her. She looked up as best she could (even though the current had her flipping in somersaults) and saw a blue and white shark with dark eyes and a gold scar on its forehead. It seemed to be just a head and a tailfin, Mew thought. It was coming straight for her.

Suddenly, Mew felt an energizing rush from the current that was sweeping her away toward the unknown. She could feel amino acids churning in the current, forming long chains of DNA that glowed in the heavily-filtered light of the deep ocean. Mew felt herself losing consciousness from the lack of oxygen, resigned that either the ocean or the strange new pokemon she had created accidentally would take her life. She could see that she was being carried to a great light that was forming further along in the current. It kept getting bigger and bigger...

"ooooooOOOOOOOOOOooooooooOOooOOOOOOO"

The strange melodic song reverberated in the current, energizing Mew to the extent that she found she once again had the energy to teleport. She appeared high up above the ocean, the salt water from the ocean falling around her from being taken during the teleportation process. Mew stared at the ship on the surface of the churning ocean as she gasped desperately for air. She could see the bright light growing near the ship. The bright blue skies darkened around her as she floated safely out of range. Suddenly, three swirling tornadoes appeared around Mew, and she teleported quickly, avoiding the mile-wide blast of light that burst from the depths of the ocean, overturning the aircraft carrier and shattering the water-colored tornadoes, knocking out a small blue-and-white flying creature with long forearms, and a similar creature, except it was red-and-white. Two giant splashes threatened to sink the ship as the creatures fell back into the ocean.

The United States, ca. 2010

Jacob Running Deer watched the pow-wow celebration. This portion of the festival was reserved for full-blooded Indians, but it might just be canceled due to a violent storm that seemed to come out from nowhere. Jacob looked up as lightning stretched for miles in every direction across clouds that blocked out any sight of the sky.

His father, tonight's storyteller, frowned. "Did you see that" he asked his boy of thirteen. "Do you know what this means?"

Jacob sighed. "It was an airplane, Dad," he muttered.

"It wasn't an airplane, son," the father retorted in a stern tone. "That shadow belonged to a creature feared by my father and his father before him. It is the great Thunderbird Himself, returning from the mountains in the west where the waisichu (white men in Sioux - I think) killed him when they took our lands and stole the buffalo he fed upon to prevent eating us. Now he's back in his homeland, and we're all going to suffer His wrath."

As the singing and dancing hit a climax during the celebration, a tremendous flash illuminated the sky. As Jacob woke up, he found everyone knocked to the ground, having been struck by lightning. He saw in horror as a giant yellow-black bird with a sharp orange beak swept down from the clouds and snatched several unconscious participants, taking them back to the mountains from which it had re-awakened as Zapdos, Titan of Lightning.


	6. Conflict

Chapter Six: Conflict

- Recap: Jennifer, an American worker for Greenpeace, (this story takes place in our "real" world, in part) is in Peru trying to prevent the destruction of the last acre of rainforest. However, there's a mystical explosion during a riot and her pet cat is transformed into Mew, the Origin, a pokemon that is the origin of all pokemon genetic codes. Mew feels that it is her purpose in life to reawaken the Legendaries from various mythologies, but tweak their powers a little so they become pokemon. Meanwhile, Jennifer, en route back to America, disappears when a chime sounds in the airport. It turns out this story is being written by Max (May's brother in Pokemon Advanced) and Molly Hale (girl who befriends unown in Pokemon 3), and a woman resembling Jesse of Team Rocket has recently been found in Hoenn with no idea what she's gotten into...

Peru, ca. 2010

A week had passed. Jacob Running Deer, his shoulder-length black hair dripping with sweat in the summer heat, sat in the open-air market, sipping the bottled water that he had taken with him. He had heard that it was wise to bring your own water when traveling to third-world countries, but the Peruvians he had met scoffed at what they felt was an arrogant injustice. Of _course_ American water seems cleaner, they grumbled, because their companies come and destroy other people's resources while they're laughing about all the money they're saving on cheap and powerless employees.

Jacob, whose father was a storyteller in Sioux-sponsored pow-wows, hoped the woman he was going to meet in this tropical ghetto was worth the airline ticket. His father had died, electrocuted by the ancient Thunderbird, a fearsome creature that ate humans and brought impossibly fatal storms. He had no one left, now, and he realized that maybe he'd even see the return of White Buffalo Woman, a holy woman who had come once before and would come again before the world atop the Great Turtle came to an end. With all the reports of strange atmospheric conditions and random explosions on CNN, he dreaded the certainty that She would return in his lifetime, maybe REAL soon.

Elsewhere in Peru, ca. 2010

Man, was she late, thought Janice Williams, her strawberry-blonde hair whipping behind her as her Jeep rumbled through the Peruvian countryside. She was supposed to meet Jacob at a little cafe in the center of the town she was approaching. After losing his father, he had been researching ancient creatures and had heard about her studies of the Nasca lines in Peru - gigantic drawings in the countryside of various figures, people, animals - drawings that could only be seen from the air. People still argued about their purpose, but she didn't believe in silly mumbo-jumbo. She felt they were ritually designed to guide one toward important water or mineral sources, nothing more.

Lately though, she noticed that some drawings had inexplicably been altered, probably by the same bored pranksters that make crop circles. On the net she was learning that historical places everywhere were reporting vandalism of one kind or another, and she wondered why she couldn't catch the vandals in the act. She couldn't stand vandals or pranksters - it was hard enough to get scientific backing to study some vague lines in the dirt, and these people were just mocking serious scientific study.

The real reason she loved to be in Peru, however, wasn't just the relics. She loved being near the ocean, the salty blue water as it crashed against the shore was relaxing. She saw the fragile beauty of the creatures of the sea, an entire class of creatures so unlike your run-of-the-mill furry quadrupeds that existed only to beg for gourmet tidbits.

The Jeep bounced heavily on the uneven terrain as she approached the village where she was supposed to meet Jacob. She grabbed an envelope as it began to fly out of the vehicle, an envelope containing satellite pictures of one of the defaced drawings - a giant bird with spread wings and huge eyes that seemed to burst from its head. The ground around the figure seemed to have been burned, ashes and charred sticks and rocks surrounded the new image.

What bothered her more than the strange vandalism today, however, was the knowledge that animals were leaving the area in record numbers, even animals like lizards that had never left their territories in thousands of years...

Lavaridge, ca. 2509

Jennifer sat in the back of the jail cell, a sparsely-furnished small room with just a sink and a small mattress, sobbing uncontrollably, her long red hair matted from running through a God-forsaken forest with animals from the Twilight Zone or some stupid kid's show - animals with bright orange and yellow fur that chased her with a speed faster than any cheetah and surrounding her in a circle of flame. Really, who has fiery animals? What kind of diseased joke was this?

She had tried to tell the police that she was innocent, that she didn't know where she was and what "pokemon" were. They kept harassing her about "Team Rocket" and "James" and "Giovanni". She warned them that the American embassy would hear about this.

They didn't know what America was.

"What country hasn't heard of America?" she wondered. "It's not like our country hasn't tried to put its stamp on every living thing on the planet (seaweed: Made in America!)."

"You're taking this FAR too seriously," a half-sultry female voice complained as Jennifer continued to sob. Jennifer looked into the cell next to her to see a young woman in her twenties with long red hair, lots of makeup, and a strange (kind of revealing) outfit - long black boots, a short (very short) white skirt, a black tank top under a short-sleeved white jacket with a large red R on it. The woman stared at Jennifer condescendingly. "You're in jail. So what? James and I get locked up just about every week and it doesn't bother us."

Jennifer stopped sobbing, the anger welling up in her throat. "James? Team Rocket James?"

The woman's eyes enlarged like balloons. "You know about us and Team Rocket?" Tears started welling up in her eyes. "I was beginning to think only the cops knew about us. (Sob) You just don't appreciate what we go through to be famous members of Team Rocket! No one here in Hoenn has even heard of us!"

Jennifer shot up from her soaking place on the floor. She grabbed the bars separating her from the woman she now knew was responsible for all this, her knuckles whitening under the strain. "YOU! I'M IN HERE BECAUSE THEY THINK I'M YOU!"

The woman smiled, then laughed haughtily. "It goes to show how cops around here pay no attention to detail. I'm prettier, more intelligent, and stronger than you. These people don't know true beauty when they see it."

The young female cop with the blue hair appeared in front of Jennifer's cell with keys dangling from her gloved hand. "I'm very sorry about this misunderstanding, Miss," Officer Jenny apologized. "I thought you were this young woman from Team Rocket we caught an hour ago stealing some pokemon. If you need a place to stay, we can set you up at a hotel if you want. Of course, you could stay at a pokemon center, but you're not a trainer and there's a competition this week, so there may not be enough room."

Jennifer lay on the freshly-cleaned bed in the hotel room set up for her by the police of some kind of town called Lavaridge, a town near some kind of volcano or something and surrounded in hot springs frequented by senior citizens trying to ease the arthritis in their joints.

Kidnapped by a strange energy. Chased by fire-breathing dogs through a dark, cramped forest. Arrested for stealing these strange creatures whose existence was just beginning to register in Jennifer's confused brain. Released and set up in a posh hotel that continued the volcanic theme - red and orange walls, fake stalactites and fake lava flows backlit in the floor, and giant air filters surrounding the hotel to keep out the volcanic ash settling from the nearby volcano.

This world was so backward and forward at the same time. It seemed to Jennifer that civilization was simpler from the life that she knew, yet their technology (especially stuff dealing with these strange animals) was light years ahead of the best stuff MIT had to offer.

Relaxing on the fluffy bed, having taken a shower and getting a massage (how forgiving the cops are here!), Jennifer mused about this new environment.

Since she technically doesn't exist, would she have to pay taxes?

Japan, ca. 2010

Mew slept soundly on the stone shrine deep in the middle of a forest in the island nation of Japan. As she slept, the surrounding foliage had grown considerably, much faster than normal. The branches and vines were just beginning to touch Mew's soft, short, pinkish-white fur when she awoke, her large pink-purple eyes letting in the sunlight after a well-deserved rest.

A bright red burst of energy came toward her. She jumped up high into the air, leaves from her temporary nest flying up in a brief cyclone. She used her psychic powers to launch the leaves, now glowing pink, toward the source of the red light.

"Unnhhh!" a young male voice shouted as Mew heard a body fall into a gaggle of shrubs.

Mew surrounded herself with a bright pink barrier as she searched for the human who had tried to attack her.

The boy stood up, a teenaged boy with black hair that came down below his ears, his blue T-shirt and red jean shorts ripped slightly from the fall. He stared at Mew for a few seconds, smiling.

"I've come a long way," the boy announced with a confident, if villainous sneer. "I had to work very hard to find a stupid Celebii. Turns out, it knows about you." The boy paused to let that sink in. "My father wants you in his arsenal REALLY bad, Mew, and he has finally given me the green light to capture you myself." Mew saw him reach for a small metallic ball, divided into a gold top and a silver bottom with the initials "GS" on the gold half. The boy pressed the button and launched the opening device toward Mew, a bright red light shooting past her.

A vine snapped up from the ground and caught the ball as it continued to approach a confused Mew, who simply floated in the air, wondering what this strange device was. She wondered also how this human seemed so ... prepared ... to catch the first pokemon on the planet.

The vine hurled the pokeball back toward the boy, who yelped as he fell back into the shrubs. He cursed as he tried to get up, but he found vines wrapping around him, squeezing him relentlessly.

Mew looked back, having sensed an enormous amount of energy behind her. Floating above the shrine, in a white light, was a tiny green figure with small insect-like wings, its dark eyes staring straight through Mew as the two powerful psychic pokemon stared each other down.

Mew tightened the barrier surrounding her. The new (or old?) pokemon surrounded itself with gigantic vines, vines that shot up two stories high, branching out, twisting, reaching out toward the sky, preparing for the moment when Celebii would smack down this innocent little pokemon. Celebii had been tricked into coming back here, to this time, and after having seen what's in store for the time from which he came, Celebii came to the conclusion that Mew was responsible for the end of the world. It was the Voice Jewel (who became Mew) had heard in Peru back when she first got her powers. The vines stretched now for at least a mile, reaching back for the most massive vine whipping the world would ever see...


	7. Tracey

Chapter Seven: Tracey

Japan, ca. 2010

SNAP!

Tracey, his black hair tangling in the vines that restrained him, tried to look up, despite the bright tropical sun, despite the black spots he was seeing as the vines tightened around him. He had fallen into a ten-foot deep ditch near the stone shrine where Celebii had brought him. He was sore, thorns embedding into his torn flesh. He strained to see, but he knew that he might just have to return home without either target. Celebii was none too happy about being tricked about going this far into the past, a past only recently discovered by an old agent of Team Rocket's - Jesse's mother, who had long been lost in the forest where Mew's fossils were rumored to reside. He knew Celebii hated Mew. The hard part had been discovering this and why two legends hated each other.

A year ago, Tracey was cleaning out Professor Oak's closets and bookshelves. In one dark closet, covered in an inch-thick layer of dust and cobwebs from neglect (Oak liked Pokemon, not cleaning - Tracey thought Oak should borrow Mrs. Ketchum's Mr. Mime for its remarkable attention to detail), Tracey uncovered a small notebook filled with the professor's own drawings - drawings made with simple charcoal pencils on white heavy paper - drawings of pokemon, like one with a Celebii sleeping next to a Pikachu.

Here were pokemon that Tracey's father had been DYING to get, because of the information, recently discovered, that Celebii might have been present when Mew was created, back before any reliable histories were available. His father had long ago found electric pokemon stronger than Ash's Pikachu, but Celebii continued to be foremost on nearly every collector's/hunter's/thief's list of powerful pokemon. It's time-traveling ability made it the most useful of any pokemon, with maybe the exception of the Unown, but those creatures were far too unpredictable, their strength unreliable. If a suitable Mew fossil could not be found, then the other obvious solution would be to enter the past, before Mew knew the extent of its true power, and returned to the future to be experimented upon to create a kind of SuperMew. Tracey's father had ordered him to track down Ash Ketchum, to see if he could get into good graces with Professor Oak. Some executives wondered why Tracey just couldn't go to Pallet and search Oak's lab, but Tracey agreed with his father - that Tracey had to be seen as a friend, one who appreciated pokemon in a manner similar to Oak. Tracey's father was a true genius; he knew Samuel Oak had been involved with Celebii as a child, and he loved to draw pokemon when he wasn't researching. Tracey was elected for this indefinite mission because he too enjoyed observing the fascinating attributes of the natural world.

Tracey took a small knife that he used for cutting paper in fine detail and snapped the last remaining twigs that kept him from seeing the carnage, the screaming and explosions and snapping of foliage, that he had heard from deep within the ditch. With great effort, hampered by the exhaustion of being wrapped by vines more ruthless than an Arbok's muscular snake-tail, Tracey climbed out of the ditch to see two of the three World Changers in battle.

Lavaridge, ca. 2509

_"... and Mew and Celebii looked at each other and decided to work together to stop this mean boy from picking on them," Molly typed as furiously as she could in her hunt-and-peck way, "but the damage was done. They had no fight left within them, so they made up and erased everyone's memories and slept soundly."_

_"NOOOOO!" yelled Max, pushing Molly out of the chair where they had been typing their story in the Lavaridge Pokemon Center. "We promised that Mew and Celebii were going to fight - you can't just have one sentence that stops the battle of the century!"_

_Molly, her long brown hair wrapped around her as she sat all sprawled out on the tile floor, crossed her arms in indignation, seething, steam practically bursting from her ears. "Legendary pokemon wouldn't hurt each other like that, Max!" she yelled back._

_Max clicked his tongue in disapproval. "Haven't you heard about the Orange Island Disaster? Lugia had to battle three other legendary birds because they were fixated on destroying the world! I think that qualifies as trying to hurt each other. History proves ME right, you're wrong - so there!"_

_Max turned his attention to the computer. They had been writing this cooperatively (mostly), but Max, soon after they began writing a story that they had started out of boredom, began to feel one with the story - that they had tapped into an important part of their world's history - that their story was the RIGHT one. Max began to type, but gasped as he saw tiny white and black figures dance across the screen. He thought that maybe a screensaver had kicked in, but his heart told him to turn around. Molly was standing there, staring at him (no, THROUGH him), staring at the computer as the air around her warped as creatures, the Unown, began flying out of her purse that she had left beside the computer. Her father didn't know she still had the tiles of Unown left from the time he disappeared. He'd ground her for all of eternity if he ever found out. Worse, she thought to herself with great trepidation, maybe she'd lose any hope she might have of EVER seeing Entei again. She was glad her father had returned, but she would never forget the powerful warmth that had come from her legendary protector. Molly gritted her teeth as she channeled the psychic energy of the Unown, saying, "Show us the truth. Unown, if Mew and Celebii were ever together, how did they act?" The unown continued to dance around the computer, typing their knowledge about Mew and Celebii without using the keyboard. Max sat in the chair, too stunned to breathe, as some of the most ancient pokemon in the world spoke their minds about that fateful day._

Japan, ca. 2010

Mew hovered in the air, high above the forest, VERY high up, as Celebii's plant monster easily stretched up to about a mile in height. Just above her floated the stone shrine that acted as a gateway for the time-traveling grass-type pokemon. Mew had to make sure that no one else from unknown times came for her. It was bad enough to be dealing with a boy and a psychic pokemon that seemed to know everything about her powers and tactics before SHE even knew what to do.

Mew glowed bright pink, although from Celebii's viewpoint the pink bubble of light was nearly lost against the bright sun. However, Celebii was a grass-type pokemon, so he simply absorbed sunlight as he waited to see what Mew would do with that shrine. If she decided to hurl it toward him, he'd catch it with his substitute.

Already Celebii had scored some hits on Mew's tender white-pink hide, slashing a good deal of fur away from the feline pokemon's body, despite the powerful barrier thrown up to protect her. Celebii had decided to use its plant creature because it turned out that nice, sweet little Mew was also capable of handing out damage. They both could recover energy, too, so this battle might take a while to settle. Celebii was absorbing energy both from the sun and from the ground, preparing for a long struggle. A part of Celebii hoped that the evil child stopped the battle early with that wickedly strong pokeball of his, but the rest of him yearned for a fight with the Origin itself.

_Five hundred years in the future, Celebii hovered over a desert close to the equator, launching different seeds and berries into the ground below as a young Suicune inundated the new life with fresh water. It had been a long time since any human or pokemon had lived in this region, so now was a perfect time to restore the forests to their former glory, before civilization destroyed them. The night before, a giant meteor had streaked through the sky, a remnant of the Millenium Comet that had passed by two centuries ago. As Celebii descended into the quickly-growing forest to rest, a human appeared. Not really, although Celebii could see a female human form behind a strange white light. The trees surrounding Celebii shimmered, and he realized that he was seeing through time. Then, an explosion knocked him backwards, and the vision faded. He chafed at the thought of the young woman, with her long red hair flowing behind her. Fifty years ago, he had been caught by such a woman, THAT woman, a woman who had once been friends with Mew, before Mew was even going by that state of existence. He had been caught in a stupid pokeball, a gold and silver one. Celebii had been hunted for the past decade because there were humans who wanted to cheat Jirachi back to life. He awoke only once every thousand years if conditions were right, and some genius humans had understood that waiting was foolish if you had a time-traveling pokemon. Jirachi could be caught at any time with a pokemon like that. Mew had found out about the plot, and instead of trying to help protect Celebii from the hunters, Mew had learned how to boost its teleportation powers from the Unnatural One and had sent Jirachi's cocoon into the sun itself, watching the solar flare come screaming toward the earth as Jirachi vaporized in the cornea of the Great Star. Mew, imbued with the same type of hatred for humans that had once paralyzed the heart of the Unnatural One, vowed to stop humans from destroying the planet - permanently. Celebii had finally stopped Mew, but now he spent most of his time restoring the earth to its former glory, painfully aware with every beating of his wings that the best tactic would have been to stop Mew before it had ever reached the zenith of its powers. It had tried, once before, although the battle had occurred far too long ago to remember the exact details..._

Mew continued to hover high above Celebii, despite the annoyance of the sound of jet planes rushing toward them. Mew glanced in every direction quickly, not wanting to take her eyes off of Celebii, and shot a psychic wave of energy in every lateral direction, shutting off the engines to the fighter planes, sending them to a watery crash into the Pacific, trying to maintain awareness of the falling parachutes while guarding against her opponent. Mew had no time for human interference. She could see a bright light coming from the mouth of the gigantic plant creature, and she knew Celebii was preparing to attack. She had to find some way, some means of taking out this powerful pokemon.

Tracey sat in awe behind a tree, barely able to see past the massive, twisting, snapping vines and branches that formed Celebii's defensive substitute. Whatever Celebii had planned, it was going to do it soon, and Tracey believed a solar beam would be the most likely choice. The sky (well, what could be seen of it) was clear on this bright sunny day, and Tracey felt a tinge of fear. It wasn't the idea of watching two powerful psychic pokemon duke it out - it was just a nagging feeling in the back of his mind, a thought that made the hair on the back of his head stand on end. It was the feeling of déjà vu. He wiped away the sweat that began to pour off his face, and he realized that it was suddenly EXTREMELY hot.

Mew, meanwhile, realized that the bright yellow beam coming for her was designed to hurt, so she flung the shrine toward the beam, flying backwards at supersonic speed as the shrine burst into tiny pieces of gravel. Well, thought Mew, that should take care of any future time travelers.

Celebii couldn't hold the form of the plant beast anymore. Tracey cried out as he dived into the ditch he had only recently crawled out of to avoid the heaping mass of plant life that came crashing down around him. Celebii threw up a barrier as he flew upwards toward Mew. Celebii was preparing to launch some seeds that would suck away Mew's energy, when a great scream was heard from above. Celebii, Mew, and Tracey glanced up to see a tremendous winged figure with gold feathers that shimmered in rainbow colors as the bird closed in on the two warring psychic pokemon. The colors of the giant bird seemed to be green one moment and gold the next, although in reality the sunlight separated into all the colors of the rainbow. The bird squawked, the sound reverberating throughout the hemisphere as it reared its head back, a bright glow of fire gathering in intensity in its beak.

Peru, ca. 2010

Jacob and Janice sat staring at each other as they watched the soil from the earth drift back to the surface in large clumps. They were in Peru, traveling by Jeep to the site of the giant bird drawing that spanned at least a quarter of a mile in length. Janice herself had had to spend countless dollars and time to convince someone to take a picture of the design, remarkable in that it had been formed only two weeks ago.

They had just arrived to the site when the earth rumbled with the mother of all earthquakes. Janice, the ocean-lover who was driving the beat-up green vehicle, slammed the brakes just as fire and lava burst from the design, flowing high up into the air. Janice and Jacob found they had been gaping like schoolchildren in front of a tyrannasaur as a bird bigger than the biggest plane squawked and screeched, flapping its flaming wings, encircling the entire area in a giant wall of flame. Then, as suddenly as it had arisen, the bird was in the sky and disappeared to the west, taking with it the blaze, leaving anyone within a ten-mile radius charred-but-otherwise-okay bodies.

After the bird had left, Jacob and Janice felt it was okay to breathe again. They looked down to find they were holding hands. Janice blushed as she looked away toward the horizon.

Japan, ca. 2010

Mew and Celebii sat high in the sky, their barriers wavering in strength, betraying their lack of confidence in facing down such a terrifying creature. In Mew's heart, although she lacked Celebii's knowledge of pokemon seen often in the future, she knew this was the Sacred Fire - Ho-oh, a phoenix-like pokemon that lived in the Americas thousands of years ago. There had been a couple of them, one for the East and one for the West. The eastern phoenix had already been revived at the same time as Zapdos, a Moltres who sprang from a mountain in the middle of Asia. Ho-oh, on the other hand, had only been on the planet for an hour, because it had sensed the coming deaths of the Voice and the Origin. If they died now, Ho-oh wouldn't have much time before the end of the space-time continuum to revive them. It fired a warning blast of fire above the two sparring pokemons' heads, then climbed higher into the sky, circling the battle scene with a focused attention that sent shivers up the backs of Celebii and Mew. With one giant motion, Ho-oh thrust its wings toward the battle (which had stopped in the face of this obvious danger). Mew and Celebii had no need to look at each other for advice; they reinforced their barriers with all their strength as a tremendous force of wind tore through the air and knocked them clean out of the sky back into the forest below. Ho-oh screeched in anger, then, sensing that the two pokemon had survived the attack, left to awaken the three Elemental Dogs, who would pronounce sentence on such an uncaring population of human beings.

Mew and Celebii lay motionless on the ground amidst the fallen brush from Celebii's plant monster, only their heaving lungs betraying any sign that they were still alive, their barriers having been destroyed soon after being hit with such a strong current of air. They could barely hear the crunching sound of footsteps and laughter, followed by the zapping/chiming sound of a pokeball capturing their data, storing them away as Tracey prepared to return to the future to hand over his greatest triumph to his father, the wonderfully-powerful former leader of the Viridian City Gym, Giovanni Sketchit. Tracey smiled, wondering about how pleased his father would be when his unfailing custom pokeball was returned to him at last. After Celebii's data was returned to the pokeball, Tracey waved a silver version of the Earth Badge, which resembled a leaf or a feather, over the GS ball, finally inserting it into a hidden slot behind the button that opened the device. He could have saved Ash and Kurt a lot of trouble had he only explained that Giovanni's own Earth badge was needed to unlock the ball, but he couldn't let Ash get such a wonderful pokemon, now could he?


	8. Destruction & Devastation

Chapter Eight, part I: Destruction

Lavaridge, ca. 2509

Lavaridge was bustling with activity. Hotels were cramped, spas were brimming with people of every demographic, streets were a perpetual traffic jam, the noise level of the thousands of people were matched only by the low rumbling of the volcanoes nearby. Ash, May, Brock, Max, and Molly were staying at the Pokemon Center with Professor Hale, who had recently arrived to coordinate the findings of the archeological team studying strange bubble languages across the countryside. Jesse and James, ever-loyal grunts from Team Rocket, were chilling out in a Lavaridge jail for trying to steal pokemon. They weren't too worried - they came here quite often, and besides, their boss would be here soon to pick them up, they hoped anyway. Jennifer, the original owner of the white cat who became Mew in the "ancient" past, dusted the volcanic ash off her dress as she sat on the balcony of the hotel where she stayed courtesy of the police who were trying to avoid wrongful-arrest charges. She had noticed the sharp increase in tourism as of yesterday, but she couldn't get anything out of the newcomers. Apparently, there was going to be a great event and no outsider was going to steal their chances of competing in it.

Hoenn, ca. 2509

A long black limousine roared across the gravel road just east of Fallarbor Town, kicking up tons of ash that made the axels of the vehicle grind - constantly. Very little identification was available just judging from the vehicle itself, although, if you looked carefully, you could make out tiny spherical red jewels embedded in the hubcaps - like the kind you'd see on Persians.

Inside the limousine, a middle-aged man was having a curt phone conversation with his female assistant. She had arranged the trip, and he was not satisfied.

The somewhat girlish voice on the speakerphone grated with irritation. "Look, sir, take what you can get," she admonished. "That entire region is influenced by volcanic activity. Our helicopter pilots can't fly there."

"THEY ARE SIMPLY INCOMPETENT AND LAZY!" the man interrupted, slamming his fist on the armrest beside him, creating a dent. "I ACCEPT NO EXCUSES! THIS DRIVE IS DRIVING ME INSANE!" He lowered his voice a few decibels to keep the windows from shattering. "Those pilots must be disciplined at once. See to it immediately."

"Yes sir," the young woman on the other end grumbled. "By the way, Agent Scyther has called in. He's awaiting your arrival in Lavaridge at the Lavaridge Volcano Hotel, room 438."

A dark smile illuminated the normally frustrated face of the aging crime boss. "Excellent," he eagerly declared, "tell him that I will arrive shortly - if these drivers can handle driving in this inconvenient terrain."

"Yes, sir," responded the young woman. Click.

The crime boss managed to retain his smile as the car drove south towards destiny.

Lavaridge, ca. 2509

Tracey lay sprawled out on the bed of his hotel room. The entire hotel had a volcanic theme, and his was no different, except that his particular room might depress most people. All of the sparse furniture was black or dark gray, nearly blending in with walls that seemed to be airbrushed in various shades of black, with only a few specks of yellow and red to suggest embers flying from an active volcano. He loved his room. He found the dark colors soothing, especially after all the hooplah he went through to capture Mew, now safely in another custom pokeball created by his father's scientists. This one, like the GS ball, required waving a special Earth badge over the device before inserting it into a hidden slot behind the release button in the center. He stared at the dark ceiling, imagining the night sky, as his thoughts turned to Ash Ketchum. He knew his "friend" was here somewhere, probably in the Pokemon Center only because it was free. He had hated staying in those cramped places in the Orange Islands when he trailed Ash. He loved the resort on Shamuti and the Orange League and this posh hotel and even the resort hotel back when his father owned a pokemon theme park. Ash was always so cheap, Tracey grumbled to himself. If it hadn't been for his mission and the chance to gain his father's loving approval, he'd have quit and gone on a cruise - it would have been much better than riding with that rotting-fish smell on top of Lapras for weeks on end. Fortunately, he and Misty could usually wear Ash down so they could ride in some decent transportation. It was a shame Misty and Ash couldn't get along, because Tracey thought THEY made a much better pair. They were both intelligent, flexible, and used to a certain standard of living. There were rumors in the bowels of Team Rocket that assumed Ash might be Giovanni's kid and that was why he always seemed to beat such an elite team of fighters. Tracey giggled. He couldn't help it. Ash was driven like Giovanni, but Ash had some sort of mental illness or something that wouldn't allow him to plan ahead.

Tracey, however, ALWAYS planned ahead.

Even when he was just five, Tracey had shown smart business sense by keeping himself secret from Team Rocket, eventually with Giovanni's approval. Giovanni and Tracey both knew that there were only a few decent grunts and executives (Domino was hot, too - but his father got kind of territorial when the two first met during an old power plant mission in east Kanto - oh well...), so they agreed that Giovanni's son would be a special secret agent, only known to the highest levels of TR administration. That was maybe, what, five people, so Tracey could happily live his life drawing and studying the powers of different pokemon and one day prove his ability to chair Team Rocket when Giovanni - Tracey frowned momentarily - left this earth. Sometimes, when his stomach was churning from stress, he wondered to himself if he would ever be as clever as his wonderful father, a father who had taken years to build up a comfortable power base.

He'd be here, soon.

He'd be so proud.

Hoenn, ca. 2509

High atop the Sky Pillar in Hoenn, a lone figure watched the skies toward Lavaridge in the north, his purplish-white fur rippling in the breeze, his long sleek tail waving in anticipation. He had arrived about six months ago, discovering this place that allowed one to see every region with a great deal of clarity, even with the naked eye. His "take no prisoners" posture impressed the guardian of the pillar, who allowed him to stay as long as he wished.

He could hear the whoosh of air as Rayquaza, a gigantic green scaly legendary pokemon, who looked like a highly decorated garden hose with a Groudon sneer and four flaring spikes jutting out from his neck, landed with a great THUMP next to the pokemon that had been created.

_I have spoken to several dragons in the north, and they are concerned about the arrival of Celebii in Hoenn_, announced the long green dragon.

For several minutes there was no reply.

_We will do nothing_, Mewtwo finally proclaimed.

Rayquaza's growl rumbled the platform atop the sky pillar. However, even in his great irritation, he knew his new companion of late would never lose a battle of wills. _Nothing? You are new on this world, and may not understand the significance of combining the Voice of the Forest with the Origin of our species, but not even the Unown can take them down if they begin to battle themselves_.

Mewtwo, still despite the jet stream that lashed around them, slowly turned toward his new companion. _I have battled Mew before, Rayquaza. I know that_ ... Mewtwo paused as he continued to stare, just catching sight in the distance of a giant crowd in the streets of Lavaridge, _... that we must do our part to plan for their destruction. No tears will bring them back. The Sacred Fire is sleeping and cannot be awakened. Our world will end if they die, but it will be pointless to get in their way_.

Chapter Eight, part 2: Devastation

Lavaridge, ca. 2509

Jennifer, her long red hair twisted up into a bun, sat on the bed of her hotel room, in faded khaki shorts and a green tank top, reading articles on the laptop she found in a drawer. It had taken her an hour or so to figure out the operating system mechanics, but it wasn't too complicated. It was like everything else on this stupid Twilight Zone world - centered around the creatures called pokemon, like the ones that chased her down. She decided to look up the origins of these strange creatures, her sullen expression betraying her disappointment. No one seems to remember what happened in the past too clearly; after about a hundred years or so of data, their records turn into a bunch of mystical silliness. Apparently, a long time ago, many records of their ancient past had been altered in some way, but since they had no originals to go by, no one understood the scope of the loss. She seemed to recognize places like Egypt, Japan, China, the United States, and Antarctica, but everything was just - wrong. Pictures of artifacts she had seen in the newspapers or on the internet were different. Maybe this was like Sliders or something, she mused to herself. Maybe she was in an alternate dimension of Earth.

Jennifer found an article, encrypted into gibberish, hidden in small font as she reviewed this world's history. As she worked to decrypt it, she gasped. There was a knock on the door.

Jennifer walked cautiously to the door and opened it ever so slightly. A young man with black hair that reached below his ears cheerfully stood in the hallway. "I hear you're researching pokemon" he stated warmly. "I like to research them, too. Maybe we could work together?"

Jennifer stood in the doorway, shivers running up her spine. Was there a surveillance system spying on her? Suddenly, the boy gasped and frowned.

"I am SO sorry!" he exaggeratedly announced. "I must be the world's biggest idiot! My name is Tracey and I'm a pokemon artist. You could contact Professor Oak in Kanto. He's the best pokemon scientist in the world and I work for him. It's just that, well..." he moaned, shifting his feet on the hallway carpet patterned to resemble lava, "...I was hacking this article I found on the internet, and I noticed someone else was looking at it, too. So I thought, you know ..."

"... we could work together?" Jennifer interrupted meekly.

Tracey grinned, almost cracking his face, his eyes bulging in happiness. "Oh yes! I was hoping for just that to happen! You wouldn't mind, would you? I mean, it would go faster if there were two people working on it."

Jennifer stood there, stunned. Still, he was a kid. It wasn't like she couldn't take him if he tried anything. "Uhh, okay, sure," she finally agreed, letting Tracey into her room. He went straight for the computer, pressing a few keys, and glancing up at her with beaming eyes.

"I fixed it!" he announced proudly. "Let's go take a look."

Jennifer and Tracey moved to the small desk on the balcony. They set the laptop onto the pale wooden table, which had burn marks etched onto the surface, and read with growing interest.

**Godzilla makes a comeback: Take pictures or run?**

By Janice Williams and Jacob Running Deer

Whatever happens, monsters are cool - even

when your home is bursting into flames amid

all the screaming.

Massive numbers of fatalities come after the

appearance of creatures large and small,

creatures ravaging the urban landscapes with

fire, electricity, water, ice, and other stuff.

Military forces around the world, stretched

by global political problems, cannot defeat

what some describe as monstrously big dogs.

Some installations around the globe are frozen,

some melted into the dirt, and some are quite

simply in tatters from excessive electrical

activity.

We were in Peru five months ago, investigating

what maybe the beginning of these terrible

monsters. The Nasca lines, ancient drawings

in the surface of the earth, changed as has

many artifacts around the globe. We personally

witnessed the birth of a fiery bird worthy of

any monster movie.

Air traffic has all but been eliminated as

gigantic birds shoot down anything that leaves

the ground.

And it gets worse. Perhaps you've already

read the stories of pets around the globe

mutating horribly and turning on their owners.

PETA seemed to be liking it especially until

one of the monster dogs froze their head-

quarters before drowning it in water. No

one seemed to care too much, though.

Three hundred casualties were reported alone

in the United States this month. Some were

from battles with the monsters, but many

stemmed from children's fascination with

big creatures that hasn't stopped with the

dinosaur craze of the nineties. Who can

forget the images of the children in a

trading card tournament, some fad they loved,

screaming as a giant yellow and black bird

burst through the stadium roof and made off

with ten frightened young ones?

Not only is the surface of the Earth under attack,

but our space program is also having setbacks.

Communication systems are being ripped apart.

Meteors have been punching holes in our

satellite systems. Freakish pink creatures

have been seen creating havoc in Siberia.

One entire Russian village was put in a coma,

supposedly after these creatures appeared.

Little left now of our way of life.

Fear, before a target of political movies,

is very real as humans give up their top

spot on the food chain.

On the other hand, anime is seeing a HUGE

profit as people see new truths in kids'

shows they once dismissed.

Jennifer and Tracey glanced at each other as they finished reading the article. Tracey wondered to himself how in depth he should let her in on Team Rocket's wealth of data about the appearance of Mew. She seemed to be connected, although he hated it when all he had was a mere hunch. Perhaps, he mused, perhaps she came from the time period where Tracey had caught Mew. Tracey glanced toward the crowds below as they gathered for the competition for later that afternoon, just as the winds shifted and swept away the falling ash from the volcanoes. He kind of thought she looked like Jesse, but obviously more intelligent. Maybe, the artist laughingly thought to himself, just maybe he could give an extra-special surprise present to his father - if he could just pull him away from that hot chick Domino.

"What do you make of it?" he asked her innocently.

Jennifer frowned. "Some of the organizations seem familiar. Do you recognize the countries?"

"Peru and Japan," he muttered. "The rest don't seem to make an impression on me as much."

Jennifer sighed. At least the kid knew something. At last, she had a burst of inspiration. She wasn't caught in some Sliders episode; rather, she was trapped in Planet of the Pokemon. She was witnessing her world's future - a future where governments had a small if any role and the entire globe just seemed to go ga-ga over mutant pets. She was beginning to realize that all this "harmony with our pokemon" stuff preached by just about anyone was maybe more of a - warning - than a zen, new age attitude.


	9. Darkness

Chapter Nine: Darkness

Lavaridge, ca. 2509

The sky was red at sunset, with gray-black fat ribbons of clouds stretching across the heavens as the winds blew away the volcanic soot-filled air. The layer of ash on the ground didn't bother the sweaty throngs of competitors - they had swarmed in the streets like hordes of Beedrill in order to catch a glimpse of prized pokemon. Music had been blaring in certain areas of town to keep everyone pumped up - and to keep the crowds from suffering through a song by any of the young Jigglypuff found in some woods a few hours earlier. Musicians were aided in their endeavor by enlisting the help of six Loudreds, their gigantic speaker-like ears and gaping mouths rumbling the air in an uproar matched perfectly by the cheers (and grumbles) of the crowd.

All eyes were glued to a hardwood ebony-colored stage as the reddish-gold sun finally set, a quartet of Alakazams using their powers to create bright lights shining toward the solitary microphone in anticipation of the speaker who just arrived by limousine. He smiled as he walked confidently toward the microphone, quickly running his fingers through his slicked-back, graying-black hair.

Jennifer and Tracey stood near two of the flashing Alakazams, having pushed and shoved their way through a restless group of angry pokemon hunters. Tracey tried to hide the goosebumps forming on his skin. He knew Ash and his friends were in town, and Ash was not the kind of trainer to ignore a call for this kind of competition. Sure enough, Tracey spotted Ash with Brock. Beside them were a young girl with long brown hair falling out of a red bandana and a boy with black hair and glasses. He noticed Ash and Brock's eyes widen as they stared at the speaker. Tracey found that odd - they couldn't know Giovanni - but then he realized that Ash had an Earth badge from Viridian. Tracey sighed. He still felt nervous about revealing his mission to Ash.

They would reconsider thinking of him as some sissier version of Brock.

"Welcome to Lavaridge, the hottest spot in all of Hoenn! Congratulations - you're the elite in the great Legendary Competition!" boasted Giovanni, his arms raised in an "I'm not a crook"-Nixonian pose.

His father was here - expecting him.

"Tonight you compete for the legendary Celebii!"

The crowd exploded with shocked approval. To think, a chance to own one of the most powerful pokemon on Earth! Sure, it had some disadvantages and using legends was considered bad form in competitions - but it wasn't like anyone actually OWNED any.

Now was the chance.

Ash and Brock gasped. They looked at each other, torn between two emotions: excitement over the prospect of having such a powerful pokemon on their team, and disgust that someone would be so mean as to catch a poor creature who had not so long ago been the target of a Team Rocket capture.

Tracey glanced back at his father.

Game time.

Jennifer leaned toward Tracey, flinching in the uproar, "What's a Celebii?"

Tracey leaned toward Jennifer and shouted, "A time-traveling pokemon! It's one of the most powerful pokemon on the planet!"

Jennifer stood there, alternating glances between Tracey and the announcer, feeling the stares of a teenaged boy nearby with short spiky black hair and squinty eyes and an orange and brown top. She knew she looked like a criminal the police had recently caught. She wondered if people here ever turned into lynch mobs. She stayed close to Tracey. He was just a kid himself, but he was someone she knew now and that brought her the minimum feeling of safety. "Why would anyone need that kind of power?" she asked.

Tracey looked at her in disbelief. This woman really was from another world.

"And now, before the competition gets under way," shouted Giovanni, gesturing toward Tracey, "... everyone, attention please! A young man is here to announce the rules: Tracey Sketchit - a native of the Orange Islands, an assistant to the (ahem) beloved Professor Oak of Pallet Town in Kanto! Please give him your full attention!"

Tracey gulped as he stepped onto the stage, trying to hide the sweat on his palms from his powerful father. Where was Misty when he needed her? Misty could always be counted on to yank your ear and tell you to get over what ever problem-du-jour bothered you. He admired her gift of perspective - except when it came to Ash Ketchum.

How could he share his love with TWO girls, though?

Kanto, ca. 2506

_Tracey stared intently at the file pulled up onto the computer screen. Venonat's stun spore took care of the power plant employees, who never suspected such a powerful attack from a bug-eyed purple cotton ball with antennae. Tracey's brand-new Marrill, meanwhile, listened with its sharp hearing skills for possible - inconveniences._

_The files this plant had on the Legendary Zapdos were amazing. Giovanni was tracking the mission of a collector who planned on, well, collecting the Legendary Birds. Tracey's assignment was to find out if that was a feasible plan without irritating repercussions. Supposedly, as Tracey reported to his father, it was a REALLY bad idea. Such a disappointment._

_"Marrill!" the tiny blue and white round pokemon cried._

_Tracey quickly completed the download on a disk and was about to turn when a sharp pain stabbed him in his right shoulder. He stumbled, then looked behind him despite the growing pain shooting through his nervous system._

_A small young woman in a black Team Rocket uniform stood in the doorway to the power plant's computer room, her long blond curls framing an angelic but devious face._

_"Stop what you're doing!" she sneered, "and face the might of the Black Tulip!"_

_Great, thought Tracey. The problem with keeping his identity secret from Team Rocket was that morons like this hassled him. "You ... unh ... have no idea who you're dealing with," Tracey grunted._

_"Oh, I'm not worried about that," the Black Tulip laughed. "I'm an elite member of Team Rocket, and I know YOU'RE in my way!"_

_Any time now, Tracey thought as he managed to yank the paralyzing flower from his back. His pokemon would give this upstart something to think about._

_Any minute now._

_"Where is my pokemon?" Tracey growled, realizing his speech was just beginning to slur._

_The Black Tulip laughed. "Oh, I've taken care of them."_

_"I ... will ... make ... you ... s ... sorry," he promised, feeling too dizzy to sit up any longer._

_She smiled as she walked up to the slouching boy, planting her white boot on his shoulder and pressing down hard. "They always say that sort of thing before losing consciousness."_

_A rumble traveled through Tracey's body. He fought the desire to pass out, staring intently at his attacker._

_He could tell a shiver had gone through her, too._

_Suddenly, the ceiling came crashing down, pinning them to the floor underneath wood and metal and broken fluorescent lighting. As Tracey lost consciousness just inches from the Black Tulip's face, he heard her grunt and scream into a small black communication device "Get your ... unh ... lazy butt over here and GET ME OUT!"_

_He could have sworn he heard his father respond._

_He was coming._

_But what kind of machine or pokemon could lift a couple hundred tons of concrete?_

Lavaridge, ca. 2509

As Tracey announced the rules for the contest, he wondered why, after Tracey had - _reclaimed_ - the GS ball from Kurt in Johto, Giovanni couldn't remember ever saving his son from the Kanto power plant north of Lavendar Town. Tracey could remember being airlifted, seeing a strange pokemon with machines all over it. Now, even Domino couldn't remember being rescued from a building damaged by an earthquake.

"Finally," Tracey concluded, "we come to the most important part of any contest - the trophy! Let's take a look at what you're gonna win!" He pushed the release button of a small pokeball.

"NO, YOU IDIOT!" screamed Giovanni from behind.

The crowd gasped. Tracey, shocked that Giovanni would yell at him in such a way, let down the pokeball and stared at it in disbelief. The ball was black and silver, not the GS ball he was expecting. He glanced up at a shining pink ball of light and silently cursed to himself.

WHAM!

Tracey and Giovanni flew back, the crowd stumbling, falling, running, staring, cheering, screaming. Mew panted nervously, confused, yet grateful to be out of that stupid thing. This was the first time she had been captured - and she was going to make certain this was the LAST time. She glanced at the crowd, sensing their reasons for being here. Pokemon hunting? A contest? Could people be so heartless?

Mew's barrier stopped an electric arc from frying her fur. A small yellow mouse-like pokemon with a lightning-shaped tail sat on a young boy's shoulders as it let loose with another crack of electricity.

All Mew could see was a throng of hateful creatures - staring at her in awe or terror. Mew could feel the greed in the humans' hearts - and she finally understood what Earth wanted from her.

Mew gathered all her energy, her bright pink energy ball growing to the size of a hot air balloon. She saw the people drop like lead as she took in the life energy of everything for a mile. She saw the young man who captured her struggle as he opened the infernal gold and silver ball that held Celebii. She saw the green winged fairy pokemon glance at Mew and disappear in a ball of light.

Celebii would NOT be exploited again.

Outside the Pokemon Center, away from the fleeing/falling crowds, Professor Hale, his long graying hair covering his strong, determined face, gripped his young daughter Molly as she began to gasp and faint, the air around them becoming - how to describe it- deader by the second. Just as he found he could not take in another breath, he saw a flurry of Unown fly out of Molly's pockets, chanting in their sing-song rhythm.

If they survived this, he'd ... talk to her ... very … sternly ...

Jennifer, lying on the ground in front of the stage, her chest heaving, her eyes rolling, felt the power emanating from this new pokemon. As the bright pink light shined above her, she remembered seeing something like it as she lay bloody on an outcrop in Peru.

"J ... Jewel," she whispered as darkness overtook her.

Hoenn, ca. 2509

High atop the Sky Pillar, where every region could be seen with crystal clarity, Mewtwo and Rayquaza leaned against some columns as the wind whipped around them, staring at the chaos as Mew sucked the life of Lavaridge.

_Mew_? Rayquaza asked. _Isn't Mew in Johto_?

Mewtwo stood motionless. By now Rayquaza had become used to his new friend's delayed responses. _Mew is no longer in Johto_, Mewtwo finally responded. _She is headed for Lavaridge to investigate the trouble there_. He looked to the floor, shuffling his feet. _It is a mistake. All psychic pokemon are now at risk - especially me_.

Rayquaza stared at the tall white pokemon, certain that he saw slight traces of that feeling you get when you know you're going to die.

_I shall summon the Powerful Ones. We will stay here where we're safe_, offered the guardian of Sky Pillar.

Mewtwo smirked, shrugging his shoulders imperceptibly in resignation.

Mew arrived just in time to see a younger version of herself steal the energy of all the people and pokemon around her. Mew powered up, sending a giant blast of psychic energy toward her misguided double.

It bounced off harmlessly.

The younger Mew glared in the direction of the blast's origin, her coat turning velvet midnight black, like a panther's pelt. The present-day Mew gasped in terror as she spotted swarms of tiny black and white pokemon swirl around the black form of Mew.

The ancient Origin had become the only Dark Legendary with the help of the Unown. The Unown, trying to help their friend Molly stay alive, had unwittingly been hijacked by the powerful will of Mew, their reality-changing powers now under the control of a pokemon destined to bring the world to darkness.

Dark Mew, as strong as she wished.

The elder Mew felt her heart sink. The most powerful Legendaries were psychic - a distinct disadvantage in this conflict. No existing fighting or bug pokemon would last a second in battle, either.

Mew needed Celebii.


	10. Double Trouble

Chapter Ten: Double Trouble

Lavaridge, ca. 2509

The sun shone through the barred window in the Lavaridge Jail, the golden rays awakening Jesse from her sound slumber. As she opened her eyes, she felt as though her Seviper had poisoned her. Her limbs creaked and barely responded to her will. As she struggled to get up, brushing away her long ruby-colored hair, wiping the drool off of her heavily made-up face, she spotted a small pinkish object in front of her. Her eyes were still too blurry, but it appeared to be round and holding something -

Gasp!

Jesse finally found enough energy to snap up, crazily crawling to the back end of the sparse cell, her eyes widening as her vision sharpened, allowing her to see an extremely angry Jigglypuff, marker at the ready. Jigglypuff was about to slap her silly for staying asleep so long, but a light pink glow surrounded it and the singing terror of the pokemon world found itself unable to sing or do anything. Jesse looked up to see a Mew floating beyond the bars to the cell. The lock unlatched and Jesse could feel in her mind that she had to escape. She followed the Mew and the sulking Jigglypuff out of the police station.

James, rapidly wiping off the marks on his face, was sitting on the steps of the police station. He saw Jesse and smiled weakly, having only recently awoken himself. Meowth lay sprawled out on his back in front of him, his eyes closed as he soaked up the sun.

"What's going on?" Jesse grumbled.

"Jess, we have to talk," James mumbled, staring back at the ground.

Jesse sat beside James, careful not to step on Meowth, and nuzzled up to her partner in crime. They were friends, nothing more, despite what Meowth liked to think. She graced her partner with a caring, compassionate glance that surprised James - she was never this nice unless she felt in her heart something was VERY wrong.

James sighed. "Mew showed me around before it found you. There's nothing, Jess - nothing. I even saw the twerps. They're just like the rest of this town."

Jesse smiled. "Well, fantastic! We can wake up Meowth and finally capture Pikachu!"

James glanced at her solemnly. "Jesse, you're not listening. Pikachu, the twerps, the town - Jess, even the Boss is here and HE won't wake up. The whole town's been obliterated." He shivered. "Meowth's not napping - he's been struck down like the rest of us."

"But we're alive," Jesse noted. "Shouldn't we be dead?"

James motioned to the Jigglypuff, sulking in the street, it's eyes welling up with tears just looking at all the people in the streets barely breathing.

"Do you remember when we held that concert in Neon City? Don't you remember that a Jigglypuff's song not only puts you to sleep but also restores you sometimes?"

Jesse watched the little pink bowling ball of a pokemon stare at the depressing sight. "Well, now that you mention, it IS ringing a few bells."

"Well," James said as he stood up, "that's what happened to us. Jigglypuff was in the jail at the time of the attack and put us to sleep first. Now that the song wore off, we're feeling better."

"James, what's going to happen to us?"

Mew flew in gentle circles around James, his shoulder-length blue hair swinging in the slight breeze. "Mew says we have to capture Celebii and fight something called a dark Mew."

Jesse groaned. Finally, she stood up and was about to pull out her paper fan to smack James, but she lost energy and fell, pulling on his white Team Rocket jacket to keep steady. She stood back up, brushed her hair back, and growled. "I'm not doing it! That little monster tried to bury me alive in vines near that stupid lake and I'm not going anywhere near it!"

"Jesse..."

"No!" Jesse yelled, waking up Meowth. "You can go capture that freak of nature if you want to, but I'm not doing it!"

"Wha ? What's goin' on, huh?" Meowth asked, glancing around the town. "What happened ta everybody?" Meowth was used to waking up in weird situations, but this scene was a first.

Jesse, James, and Meowth watched as Mew floated away, toward a leveled stage in the center of town. They followed, each wondering silently if they were the last people and pokemon on the planet. They saw the twerps and their pokemon, lying still on the ash-covered ground, barely breathing, comatose. Jesse and James had spent years trying to capture Pikachu and defeat Ash's party, but he always defeated them. Now, here they were, helpless, in the perfect position for total victory - and these crooks with no promotions in sight but plenty of fanfics and websites devoted to them just couldn't find it in their hearts to do this to their chronic opponents. It just wasn't right.

Besides, they knew that, when it comes down to it, Ash would have been willing to stop a fight to save them.

Beside one of the speakers lay a red-haired woman that Jesse recognized as having been in the cell next to hers for a while. Jesse snorted.

"Hmph. Looks like her little get-out-of-jail free card didn't work out quite so well after all."

Jesse saw James and Mew staring at her. She laughed nervously. "Ha, ha. Just kidding! Really, you guys have to learn to lighten up!"

Mew stared at the young woman as she lay on the ground. Mew began to shine with a pink glow, and the woman gasped as she lifted slightly into the air. Her eyes flew open, she screamed and made Mew lose her concentration, dropping the woman down on the ground with a thud. Mew looked down on her sympathetically.

Jennifer gazed up at the young man and woman and the cat with the Egyptian motif thing on its head. She found it odd that it stood like Garfield instead of a normal cat. Then again, this whole world was too weird for her.

Mew floated just in front of her. Jennifer found herself too nervous to scream. Mew mewed, doing cheerful loop-de-loops in the air.

"Mew here says ya don't gotta worry," the cat said. "She's not the one who attacked da city."

"You talk?" Jennifer mumbled in shock. It's official, she thought to herself, this was one screwed up world.

"Look," the woman that Jennifer remembered was named Jesse sneered, "this is our Meowth. He can talk human talk and that's why he's a valuable member of Team Rocket!"

Jennifer stared at the trio. "Ooookayyy..." She couldn't understand how they could brag about being thieves so easily.

Mew mewed several times before flying high up into the air. Meowth translated as a bright white light surrounded them slowly, "Mew says we gotta go! We gotta find Celebii so's we can save da world or somet'ing."

Just as Jennifer felt herself slip away, she saw and grabbed the GS ball from the edge of the stage.

They soon found themselves standing next to a large lake in the middle of a forest. Jesse frowned and closed her eyes, refusing to look at the place where she nearly died. She's been on a sinking ship, she's been on a ghost ship, she's crashed multiple submarines in the ocean, she jumped hundreds of feet from the air into the ocean to let Lugia go save the world, and she fell among a couple of tons of plant life into this lake - if she had to suffer anymore water-type disasters, she'd seriously think about joining Team Magma's mission to vaporize all the water.

"What are we here for?" James asked. There was nothing around. No pokemon, no nothing - just Team Rocket, Jennifer, and Mew. "I mean, it's not like we should just EXPECT Celebii to be flying around out here."

Mew flew across the lake toward a large blue wavy four-legged object in the distance, the only other sign of life besides the trees. Jennifer strained to see. "What is that?" she asked.

Meowth squinted to see what she was talking about. "Dat's a Suicune. He's a Legendary Water Pokemon. He takes care of all fresh water and da people around here called him da North Wind."

"Why is Mew going over to him?"

"Probably to find out where Celebii is," James answered, quickly flipping through a guide book. It wasn't that he couldn't remember these pokemon, but the actual legend was something he never cared to think about, what with his … partner … nearly losing her life and all. "Celebii guards all plant life and Suicune gives the forest fresh water. If any pokemon might have heard of its whereabouts, it'd be Suicune."

Mew finally came back, mewing excitedly, then somberly. Everyone stared at Meowth.

Irritated, Meowth grumbled. He had an almost unique talent (ever since they met the Orange Islands Slowking, Meowth's pride has been taken down a notch), and it irked him when everyone got so dependent on his ability to communicate with everyone. "Mew says Celebii flew da coop. Suicune said Celebii didn't want to be around as an evil Mew went around rippin' da place up, so it went far into da future."

So they walked through the forest, disappointed. Soon they noticed a stone shrine half-covered in vines.

"Hey!" Jesse announced gleefully, "This is that shrine that Celebii uses to teleport through time!"

Jennifer walked up to it as Mew flew around her in circles, watching for any signs of danger. She could see a small rounded indentation on the surface of the shrine. Something that could hold a ball, she mused to herself. Before she reached for the GS ball, though, Mew stopped her.

"Mew says we gotta tink about how we're gonna catch Celebii," Meowth explained. "She says Celebii left in kind of a huff because one of da twoips captured it."

Jesse and Jennifer stared at each other for what seemed like an hour. Finally, Jennifer smiled. "You got any extra clothes?"


	11. Catch Me if You Can

Chapter Eleven: Catch Me If You Can

Cinnabar, ca. 2959

Celebii perched on a blackened tree branch, soaking in a bright noon-day sun. He had been flying around Kanto for five months, ever since he escaped through time to avoid battling Mew. He didn't like to bring pokemon through time. Nature was a delicate balance, and there was no telling what could happen.

Celebii noticed some fishermen resting on the black beach of what used to be Cinnabar Island. The only sign of the volcano was a five-story lump of molten rock. Celebii had been trying to assess what kind of damage had been done.

It wasn't that Celebii was a coward.

Really.

Something was WRONG with that Mew - very wrong.

Celebii watched the fishermen as they stopped napping and started poking the carcass of a rotting Sharpedo as it bobbed up and down at the edge of the tide. The ash from the volcanic explosion had claimed the lives of hundreds of marine life, the water too acidic to promote life.

Celebii wished Suicune was here, though he was more of a freshwater pokemon. They had become great friends, ever since he had fallen asleep one morning and nearly had the back of his head chopped off when pokemon hunters tore through his precious forest with huge machetes that left snarled, broken twigs, sap dangling from them, swaying.

Suicune had nursed him back to health, with pure water from the lake he had created. Suicune did that kind of stuff all the time - creating restorative lakes throughout Johto. When Celebii had to face the darkness as hunters manipulated him into destroying the forest, somewhere, deep down, he knew his friend would be there to save him.

He had reason to hope.

Celebii waited until nightfall, after the rest of the humans left, and soared high above the charred ruins of Cinnabar Island, tossing seeds into the dead earth. This was what Celebii loved - creating new life out of death, contributing to the continuation of the planet.

There was always hope.

ZZZZZZAAAAPPPP!

Celebii shot upwards, narrowly avoiding the red energy bolt signifying potential capture by a pokeball.

Jennifer glanced back quickly at James and Meowth, scowling as she held the GS ball. "This thing - can I try it again?"

James nodded nervously as Meowth screamed, dodging a shower of razor-sharp leaves slicing through the air.

"We gotta get outta here!" shouted the feline pokemon. Pokemon thievery was great and all – until they started getting attacked, then it wasn't fun anymore.

Jennifer glanced around as they stood atop the volcanic remains, then grit her teeth as she stared intently at the pokemon that caused Mew to get like this. "I'm staying - arrgh!" she yelled as she dodged several vines shooting up from the ground where she stood moments earlier, "- I'm staying until this aggravating chunk of flying grass gets shoved into this tiny little ball!"

Jennifer ran after Celebii as it headed for the beach. Without averting her gaze, she shouted, "What are you waiting for?"

James and Meowth looked at each other. "Oh. Right. Yeah," they responded in unison.

James hurled a pokeball into the air. "Cacnea, go!" A squat, spiky cactus pokemon materialized and was about to rush James when Meowth jumped in front of her, unsheathing his claws, growling.

"Focus, moron! We got bigger fish ta fry!"

Cacnea let out wave after wave of tiny needles from her tough skin, herding Celebii toward the surf. As the grass/psychic pokemon flew toward the churning ocean waves, a huge glob of purple liquid flew past him. Celebii glanced downwards, spotting a large black and purple snake writhing across the land, brashly spitting venom at the Legendary Pokemon. Celebii shot out a large vine, sending it straight for this new attacker.

A long red-haired woman popped up from beneath a black shawl and caught the vine with her heavily-gloved hand. With a quick yank, Jesse jerked Celebii out of the sky. He landed with a hard thump on the rocky ground, his legs sprained and a wing slightly bent. Celebii looked up at the woman and her Seviper, panting. Jesse wrapped the vine around him as Seviper hissed menacingly. Jesse towered over her victim, fighting the urge to gloat. This was the most important capture she had ever accomplished, the Boss would be ecstatic (well, when he regained conciousness, anyway), and here was a Legendary Pokemon, right in her grasp -

"That's enough gloating!" ordered Jennifer as she, James, and Meowth finally caught up. They were all breathing heavily from running over to Jesse and Seviper.

Jennifer, wiping the sweat from her forehead, grabbed Celebii by the throat with her gloved hands. She fit in one of Jesse's uniforms pretty well, although Jennifer couldn't shake the emabarassing thought that she was exposing too much skin. She grinned maliciously at the small green pokemon.

"You listen to me, you bag of lawn clippings! You're going to get in this ball and... "

"- Hey!" Jesse shouted, her blood vessels throbbing around her temples. "I caught this poke ...". Jennifer shot her a devastating glare, and Jesse said no more.

Jennifer returned her glare toward Celebii, " - like I was saying, you're going to get in this ball and take care of this problem or I'm going to feed you to these people here, with some peanut butter on top. Or perhaps I could dunk you in the ocean. They say poison hurts you more because you're made of grass, and this water looks pretty deadly to me." She brought her captive closer, just inches from her face. "Are you going to help us? Or am I going to have to sprinkle your leaves on a baked potato just to see how it tastes." In the corner of her eyes, Jennifer could see Jesse and James cowering on the ground, whimpering in fear of her tantrum. She fought the urge to smile.

Celebii nodded, while a chime resounded, signaling a trip through time.


	12. Time's Up & The End

Chapter Twelve, part one: Time's Up

Near Mahogany Town, ca. 2509

Night had fallen, tiny specks of stars glistening across the black expanse. No moon could be seen, just empty space where it should be. Most people were asleep, but not Teresa. She had only moved back to this town last year. Her ex-husband had died in some sort of laboratory accident, but no one could seem to remember what happened or who was involved. Only his absence from this world was a reminder that fate was indeed fickle. Teresa watched television tonight, instead of preparing for her interview for the daily news, and caught sight of widespread devastation. The cameras displayed countless scenes of land that seemed to rot right there as you watched, people dropping like swatted Yanmas, their pale mouths gaping for breath as a tremendous black ball hovered over each area, leaving nothing but death or near-death in its wake.

It was difficult for her to move back. Many of her former neighbors were still here, and they kept asking her about her daughter and her ex. Both had left this world. In fact, it was because of their daughter's premature demise that made her husband go off and try to bring her back. That's why, no matter where she lived, all of her personal belongings from the past stayed in boxes in a storage facility. She only had enough items to get through the barest of lives, leaving a house so empty there was always an echo. Only a small kitchen, a couch, a television/radio, and a bed furnished her spacious home. Her therapist had tried to help her, but she only felt despair. With the news that her husband, her ex-husband, had died, she felt she could move on a little, but she would always feel a gap in her heart where her family should be.

As she clicked off the TV, she felt a strange presence behind her. She got up and looked through her front bay window toward the street outside. Strange, she could have sworn she felt someone out there, watching her. All she could sense now was a tremendous feeling of loneliness. She turned off the lights in her house and went to sleep, wishing whoever had been out there good luck.

A small cemetery lay just outside of town. It was cold, a dense mist shrouding the gray stone markers. Had anybody been out, a tall figure would have been seen, staring at a small marker, neglected for years, with moss covering the last name.

Yet, somehow, even though he couldn't quite remember, he felt more of a connection with the young girl buried here, a girl this marker called Amber. All he could remember was the ghostly image of a girl fading into specks of light as the moon shone above a nearby neighborhood.

Wondering, as he hovered there, if the time had come to join her at last.

Lavaridge, ca. 2509

Pokemon of all kinds swarmed the volcanic town, staring in disbelief at the sight of all the dead and dying. Most were crying by this point tonight. A long time ago, such tears may have been enough to bring these lives back, but they all felt that now, well, only the Sacred Fire could restart the world again.

Only it wouldn't wake up.

Hoenn, ca. 2509

Jennifer, Team Rocket, Mew, and Celebii floated up towards Sky Pillar, and Jennifer stared open-mouthed at such a tremendous structure - at least until a gnat zipped into her mouth. When they landed, the humans of the team screamed as a giant green dragon loomed over them, snarling. Mew floated up to it, mewing softly, and listening carefully as the fearful creature replied.

"Dis pokemon's called Rayquaza," Meowth explained, "and Mew's askin' it if he can help us defeat Dark Mew." Meowth listened to the continuing conversation carefully. "(sigh) Rayquaza said he can't. He invited all the legendaries here, but dey never showed, and a friend o' his got up and left without sayin' good-bye." Meowth whimpered. "He doesn't tink we're gonna make it."

"Tell him that's not good enough, Mew," Jennifer ordered. "Tell him we demand he help us!"

"What are you doing?" Jesse half-shouted, half-whispered in horror. "No one orders a Legendary pokemon around!"

Jennifer snorted in irritation. "Look, let's all face reality here. Dark Mew's killing everyone and as I understand it no one can take it down because there's some kind of disadvantage." She stomped up to Rayquaza, frowning. "I'm not going to just sit here and wait to die," she announced. "There has to be a solution and I'm not going to be happy until we get one."

"But no other Legendary has the right type to fight a powerful dark-type pokemon," James countered, losing the fear in his normally terrified voice. "There aren't any fighting pokemon powerful enough to take her."

Jennifer shot a look of disgust to Team Rocket. "So, you're saying no pokemon except ones with the combined might of all the characters on Dragonball Z can stop the end of the world?"

"What?" Team Rocket asked, utterly confused.

Jennifer smiled. "Never mind. Don't worry about it. We need a solution you guys can handle. What about military?"

"Have none," Team Rocket announced in unison.

"You're kidding me," Jennifer said, exasperated.

"Only private organizations have any kind of firepower," Jesse explained. "There really isn't any kind of government control."

That explains a lot, Jennifer thought to herself.

"So, we'll have to lure it into a trap," she announced. "Mew, why do we need Celebii if it's psychic like you?"

Mew mewed rapidly, flying around the platform that made Rayquaza's lair.

"Mew says Celebii's gonna help trick Dark Mew back in time," Meowth translated. "Dey don't like each other, and Celebii's gonna be our bait." Celebii protested. "He don' like it, but it is kinda his fault anyway, so DAT'S WHAT IT'S GONNA BE!" Meowth shouted, glaring at the quivering pokemon.

"And the point of time travel would be ..."

"Mew says you just gotta trust her and find out," Meowth announced. "Besides, remember that this Mew has ta live for our Mew to live because it's da same Mew. If the past one dies, this one will too."

Chapter Twelve, part two: The End

Everybody dies.

The end.

Just kidding.

The United States, ca. 2010

GASP!

A young woman instinctively drew the first breath she had had in hours. Her head swam in a numbed pain, her muscles audibly ripping with every slight movement, her blood dripping down the rocky outcropping where she found herself lying. Time had been a dark, lonely eternity as her mind floated in nothingness. She tried to open her eyes, but they had long ago been swollen shut from her injuries.

How?

How did she get there?

The young woman tried to remember, but clear memories were growing rarer.

Oh yeah...

The world was ending.

Forgot about that.

Jesse helped the aching Jennifer to her feet. She and Jennifer had been hit the hardest, and they still didn't know where James was. It was a miracle that they were still alive, but Jesse's Wobbufett, a teardrop-shaped pokemon with a weird tail and a strange, almost creepy expression, had used up the last of its strength to protect them, shielding them with what Jesse called Mirror Coat - but the blast had still been too powerful, and now the pokemon that had spent its time irritating the members of Team Rocket was gone.

Jesse, James, Meowth, and Celebii had followed Mew and Jennifer to the "ancient" past, the time of Mew's birth, but they had to be careful about not upsetting the space-time continuum, so they arrived shortly after Tracey had caught Mew. They were trying to defeat Dark Mew, the first pokemon - the one that had acquired the reality-changing powers of the Unown and manipulated them into changing its type from psychic to dark. This meant that only a few types were really good at beating it, but fortunately for Dark Mew, she was as strong as she wished with the help of the Unown and had near-infinite power.

It had been Mew's (our good Mew, who challenged Mewtwo at New Island) idea to trick Dark Mew. The current pokemon world just wasn't capable at that time to face that challenge, so, ironically, it was Jennifer's time period that stood the best chance.

Jennifer and Jesse, despite their pain, climbed back up the cliff to the battle, but no one was there - only charred earth, drained of its life energy, just like everything Dark Mew touched.

Kanto, ca. 2507

_Back in the future, Team Rocket and Mew had lured Dark Mew to a dark forest in Kanto. There were no humans and no pokemon, but plenty of power hidden in a temple ruin carved from the side of a cliff. _

James remembered the place - Pokemopolis. It was an ancient city that worshipped pokemon. It was notable that the pokemon from that era were gigantic and strangely marked and super-powerful. Fortunately for our world-saving team, Team Rocket remembered which artifacts released what pokemon. They thought the best chance they had was to release the pokemon from a huge bell.

As Dark Mew struck at the party again and again, forcing them to flee inside the temple, a boulder came loose and struck the bell. Soon, an enormous Jigglypuff emerged, and "good" Mew quickly disabled its ability to sing. Well, that just made the pink ball REALLY mad...

As Dark Mew flew in to headbutt it into the face of the cliff, Jigglypuff frowned, unable to even growl, and spun around with amazing speed, punching Dark Mew into the rock, bashing her once in the head, once in the tail, and finally in the dead center of Dark Mew's chest.

"Dat Jigglypuff knew Brick Break?" Meowth had said in wonder.

As Dark Mew slowly peeled off the rock, Jigglypuff returned to its bell-shaped container, and our team grabbed Dark Mew, while Celebii gathered energy to bring them into the past.

The United States, ca. 2010

"JAMES!" Jesse screamed. For the love of all that was ever good in her life, please Lord, let James still be alive. She had always wondered if he liked her. Her heart had skipped beats when he chose her over his inheritance. Her mind reeled in joy (although she didn't dare show it) when he found herbs to heal her when she had been stunned. Yet, she pushed him away. He would never understand – he grew up among riches and opportunity. She wanted desperately to have the same thing, but it seemed as though James' loyalty to Team Rocket was waning ever so slightly. He may be able to afford to quit, she muttered to herself, but her past left her no choice. If it came down to a choice, she had to put her future first.

Meanwhile, Jennifer stared at the surrounding area. When she had climbed out of that mess in Peru, she had found herself facing a similar sight - complete and total devastation. Now, this same Mew, who was only less than a year old really, was the one causing it, instead of bombs and strange space-time continuum explosions.

Jennifer and Jesse walked cautiously and nervously across the scorched earth, feeling their stamina drain just from touching the sucked-dry land. Soon, Jesse stopped.

"There!" she yelled, pointing to the tops of some pine trees across the clearing.

It was cold, although there was no snow today on this particular mountain in the western United States. At least, that's where Jennifer thought they might be, since they passed a totaled SUV with western California plates.

Jennifer saw it: Dark Mew, panting, holding up James and Meowth telekinetically. Even though her elemental type had changed, she still kept her psychic powers, although she was beginning to realize that the type change reduced the strength of her psychic blasts. Dark Mew looked like it had been run over by a tank, its fur stripped in many places and what was left was caked in blood.

She was holding hostages.

Jennifer found that strange, although she was maybe as scared as Jesse about the victims' safety. Why would Dark Mew, who had declared war on Earth (or humanity, rather, as it saved its biggest devastation for urban targets), spare the lives of others, even temporarily - instead of just offing them and carrying on?

Jennifer glanced at Jesse. Jesse returned the glance and nodded.

Dark Mew was hurt.

Celebii and Mew had been playing defense mostly. Celebii summoned multiple plant creatures to shield the humans, and Mew, since she carried the genetic archetypes of all pokemon, blasted Dark Mew with blasts of fire, ice, lightning, water, and even grass.

"We give up!" Jesse screamed.

"WHAT?" yelled Jennifer. Has this woman finally flipped her lid?

Jesse looked at Jennifer, tears welling up in her eyes. "I - I - I can't watch them get hurt anymore, Jennifer. Whatever Dark Mew wants, let's just give it to her."

Jennifer stood there, dumbstruck, her mouth opened wide in disbelief. However, she noticed Dark Mew slowly lowering her hostages. She glanced back at Jesse, who seemed to be trying to communicate to her something important, through just her stare, a meaning that was lost on Jennifer as she nervously glanced back to see if Dark Mew was really going to let them live.

Dark Mew, however, was no fool. She kept a tight rein on her victims, just in case these humans had more tricks than she thought.

Suddenly, it got EXTREMELY hot.

Dark Mew glanced up as she finally sensed the change in temperature. The sun seemed to grow a thousand times brighter, bathing everyone in light, burning their injured skins.

A screech tore through the sky as flames shot past the trees, finally taking on the form of Moltres, its orange, red, and white flames/feathers burning strong. Just as Dark Mew dropped her hostages to attack this pokemon, a roar made the trees shake violently. Dark Mew, caught off guard, slipped off the branch on which she had been perching, falling some ten feet before she finally regained herself and hovered just above the ground under the trees where she thought she could avoid Moltres' gaze.

A fire blast the size of Epcot center ripped through the forest, the crackling of burnt wood almost completely masking the pounding footsteps of a large, red dog/lion-looking thing, with trails of faint smoke plumes rising from its back, its mane rustling in the wind generated by the fires. Entei stomped his foot into the ground, snorting, challenging Dark Mew to a battle.

Dark Mew stared at Entei, unable to block the flamethower attack by Moltres, who zoomed down through the sky at mach 2 speed, drowning everything around it in flames. Dark Mew lay sprawled out on the ground, smoking, barely able to breathe.

Jennifer realized she hadn't seen Celebii or Mew. In fact, she didn't remember seeing them at all since she and Jesse got knocked off the cliff.

While Entei stood his ground, Moltres flew off, screeching in triumph. Dark Mew tried to recover her energy, but she felt ... cold. The coldness of death, Dark Mew thought gloomily to herself. Soon, however, that gloom gave way to anger. How dare they? _She_ had created them all, she had given them purpose in life, she had awakened the Titans to cleanse this dark and terrible world of hate and greed. They believed in this mission as much as she, she just could feel it - why would they abandon their mission to stop her?

Johto, ca. 2509

Back in the future, Mewtwo sat on a rock near Purity Lake, a body of crystal-clear water he had teleported into the heart of Mt. Kayna, meditating on the nature of death. He had come close to it once before, when Giovanni held him in a powerful dark-energy device that nearly destroyed him.

He wasn't afraid of death, but he thought of all the people and pokemon he had met, creatures who had taught him that he belonged in this world, despite his past. He didn't want to leave them, he found himself thinking. That child, Ash - he was someone who gave his life for his pokemon - yet he did it because he cherished life so.

Does acceptance of death make one weak? Mewtwo wondered. Does fighting it go against nature?

Deep down, he knew something that he couldn't tell anyone. He knew how Dark Mew felt as it ripped through the countryside. He, too, had known the hatred of humanity and mistrust of anything from this world. Yet, somehow, he felt that he had more in common with this dark Mew than the Mew that had been his friend ever since their battle.

The United States, ca. 2010

Present-day. Or past, depending on your point of view. Dark Mew still couldn't move much, it had been thoroughly paralyzed by the latest string of attacks. She could see where her arrogance had gotten her now: she was focused so much on one group of enemies that it never occurred to her that they would work independently to reach the same goal. You see, if they worked as a team, of the same mind, she could have sensed every participant's plan. But, nooooo, the humans and pokemon weren't communicating a plan at all - they were independent agents.

The coldness was numbing her pain. She soon felt she might be able to get back up. Just as Dark Mew sat up, a shower of ice enveloped her, freezing her to the ground. A twirling, warbling Articuno dived into the clearing, its wings blowing back the freezing humans and the Meowth. Entei walked up to them, gathering them into one group, and radiated a gentle heat to keep them warm as Articuno unleashed wave after wave of ice until he had formed a pyramid of ice two stories high, encasing Dark Mew completely.

Dark Mew struggled to get out. She called upon the hidden power of the Unown, but she couldn't sense their presence. Dark Mew felt her energy dip.

Uh-oh.

The Unown, tiny black and white pokemon who lived in another dimension, the dimension of imagination, took the form of letters, although sometimes the resemblance was tenuous at best. As Dark Mew's concentration focused more on attacking than summoning their power, some of them had been able to return to that dimension. The rest were solidly held in thick vines that sapped their energy every few minutes.

Celebii watched them intently as it tightened its grip on the wayward pokemon. It wasn't their fault for what happened, and they were trying to do the right thing by helping their friend, but they had to be stopped to stop Dark Mew. She wouldn't be able to summon their powers at all if they had no energy left.

Now, it was up to Mew to find the Sacred Fire, as destiny proclaimed.

Dark Mew felt weak, her skin beginning to pale. She thought it was because of the tremendous cold, but she noticed her fur begin to pale as well. Dark Mew sighed. Well, that's it. The Unown are no longer under her control. The pokemon she had created would abandon their destiny and destroy her when she returned to normal.

Death was certain.

There was no hope.

Evil would triumph.

Her mission would fail.

The ice finally melted, inundating everyone with a cold bath that numbed the pain of their injuries. Entei gathered them up and leapt high into the sky, away from the blood-stopping cold. As he carried them away, the ice revealed a white-pink feline pokemon, shivering, her mind reeling from the intense temperature changes.

As young Mew began to lose conciousness, she looked up and saw Celebii, smiling compassionately at the resigned Legend.

_Why?_ Mew asked, her thoughts barely able to be projected. _I created them. I created you - I think. Why did you turn against me?_

_Nature must be reborn, it's true_, Celebii replied. _However, when a forest fire burns everything, plants can grow anew because the energy of the previous generation lies beneath the surface. The destruction you wrought took away even that latent energy, preventing the world's rebirth_. Celebii looked up, but young Mew could not follow his gaze. Finally, Celebii glanced at the dying pokemon and frowned, even with his compassionate eyes. _Try not to take this personally_.

Mew felt a strong wave of energy ripping her apart, felt flames hotter than anything she had ever experienced vaporize her body, felt nature itself rip open space and time to destroy her.

With a single tear, Mew smiled, relinquishing what little hold she still had of life.

Celebii and Ho-oh stared at the scarred remains of Mew, watching as pieces of fur twirled in the breeze. The current Mew lay sleeping on the ground, exhausted, its mind wiped of all its previous experiences through multiple jumps in time. Ho-oh resurrected Mew as it died, but Celebii kept her jumping through time so she would ultimately forget the murderous rampage of the past. Celebii took a piece of fur - all that remained of a pokemon who hated humanity and controlled unknown amounts of true power, and flew off, carrying it to an ancient temple ruins where it would stay until discovered many decades later by Team Rocket scientists.

Epilogue:

Rustboro City, a swarming bustle of activity, even this late at night, noisily went about its business. Jesse, James, and Meowth were camping beside the pokemon center where Ash and company slept, having decided to take things easy after waking up in makeshift hospitals, remembering only the vaguest details about being attacked by legendary pokemon.

High atop a spire of the tallest building in the city, Mewtwo stood, watching, aware that he had been granted life, despite all his feelings to the contrary.

Just behind him floated Mew, cheerfully flying loop-de-loops, enjoying even the simplest pleasures in life, like poking Mewtwo's tail just to see if he'd twitch.


End file.
